
A Lubaland Headman. 
A type of Hunter-Chief in Lubuland, Katanga 



IN THE HEART OF 

BANTULAND 



A RECORD OF TWENTY-NINE YEARS' PIONEERING 
IN CENTRAL AFRICA AMONG THE BANTU PEOPLES, 
WITH A DESCRIPTION OF THEIR HABITS, CUSTOMS, 
SECRET SOCIETIES fcf LANGUAGES 



DUGALD CAMPBELL 

FELLOW OF THE ROYAL ANTHROPOLOGICAL INSTITUTE 



WITH MANY ILLUSTRATIONS & A MAP 



PHILADELPHIA 
J. B. LIPP1NCOTT COMPANY 

LONDON : SEELEY, SERVICE & CO., Ltd. 
1922 



Printed in Great Britain at 
The Mayflnver Press, Plymouth. William Brendon & Son, Ltd. 



/ 



CONTENTS 



CHAPTER I 

I'AGE 

Dead Man's Land ......... 17 

CHAPTER II 

The Slave Trade ........ 26 

CHAPTER III 

Government and Socialism ....... 35 

CHAPTER IV 

Native Laws 46 

CHAPTER V 

Peace and War ......... 57 

CHAPTER VI 

Cruel Customs . . . . . . . . . . 67 

CHAPTER VII 

The Man from Below ........ 75 

CHAPTER VIII 

Totemism, Exogamy, and Taboo ...... 87 

CHAPTER IX 

Secret Societies and Guilds ....... 96 

CHAPTER X 

Secret Societies and Guilds {continued) ..... 107 

CHAPTER XI 

Native Enterprise and Industry . . . . . .118 

1 1 



1 2 Contents 

CHAPTER XII 



PAGE 

Food and Drink . 128 



CHAPTER XIII 

Native Dress and Habits . . . . . . . 139 

CHAPTER XIV 

Courtship and Marriage 150 

CHAPTER XV 

Polygamy and Polyandry . . . . . ' . . 159 

CHAPTER XVI 

Bantu Children ......... 167 

CHAPTER XVII 

Surprise Stories 175 

CHAPTER XVIII 
Hunting and Fishing . . . . . . . . 186 

CHAPTER XIX 

Study of Language 197 

CHAPTER XX 

Language and Languages 206 

CHAPTER XXI 

Bantu Literature ......... 223 

CHAPTER XXII 

Fetishism and Medicine ........ 234 

CHAPTER XXIII 
Theology and Religion ........ 244 

CHAPTER XXIV 
Arabs and Islam 253 



Contents 1 3 

CHAPTER XXV 

PAGE 

The Story of the Katanga ....... 262 

CHAPTER XXVI 
Sport and Travel ......... 274 

CHAPTER XXVII 
Sport and Travel (continued) ....... 284 

CHAPTER XXVIII 
Early Days of North-East Rhodesia ..... 295 
Index ........... 309 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 



A LUB ALAND HEADMAN Frontispiece 

FACING PAGE 

The Last Slave Caravan 32 

Pottery Industry ......... 48 

Greeting a Village Headman . . . . . 64 

Headdress of Women and Children, Chokwe Tribe ... 64 

From "Dead Man's Land" 80 

An Elaborate Headdress . . . . . . . .112 

A Dancing Demon-Possessed Girl . . . . . .112 

A Cotton Spinner 120 

Harvest Song and Dance . . . . . . . .120 

Home Scene in Bantuland ....... 136 

Malting Grain for Beer . . . . . . . .136 

Hair-dressing .......... 144 

Congo Chief and Head Wife . . . . . . .152 

A Paramount Chief with His Two Wives and Two Sons . 160 

15 



1 6 List of Illustrations 

FACING PAGE 

A Masked Devil-Doctor 192 

Head of a Tiger-Fish 192 

Headdress of Luban Chief ....... 192 

Headdress of Native Woman 192 

An Ant-hill as a Dwelling ....... 208 

Devastation .......... 240 

Musicians 240 

Lake Mweru Chief 264 

Matiamvo 264 

Headdress of Bantu Woman ....... 264 

Congo Man with Two Horn Fetishes ..... 264 

A Stockaded Village ........ 280 



In the Heart of 
Bantuland 



CHAPTER I 
Dead Man's Land 

THE expression used almost continuously during 
the late war of a man " going West " is a pure 
Africanism, for every Bantu negro when he dies 
" goes West." One of the peculiarities of Bantu languages 
is that the only geographical directions recognised and 
fixed are west and east, sunset and sunrise. There are no 
words for north and south. The west has always been 
associated among the Bantu tribes with darkness and 
death, misery and misfortune. The West was the home 
of the slavers whose coming with firearms and rum brought 
devastation and sorrow to countless peoples, and " to go 
West " to tens of thousands of Africans meant literally to 
go to sure and certain death ; the red road from the interior 
to the West Coast it was, alas ! only too truly. In these 
parts of Africa where I have lived for the past twenty-nine 
years of my life, the West Coast is known as Mbonshi or 
" dead man's land." The root word signifies " Hell," and 
is so translated in many missionary publications. Just as 
Kabanga means the East, and suggests to the native the 
origin and beginning of things, the source of life, light, 
and fertility, and a man when he is buried must be laid 
" facing the east, sir ! " so the West connotes darkness and 
b 17 



i8 



Dead Man's Land 



death, and, to the negro mind, the savage state out of 
which he is trying to emerge, and he finds there one of 
several solutions to the colour question. " Did not God 
create you white people in the daytime and us blacks 
during the night ? " " In the white man's country it was 
dawn long ago, whereas it was still night in the black man's 
land." A crude truth ! 

Catumbella, three miles from Lobito Bay, one of the 
great, new seaports of Africa, used to be called by the 
Portuguese o bocca d' inferno, " Hell's mouth," or " door- 
way," so that, from the European as well as the African 
point of view, the Bantu name of " dead man's land " for 
the West Coast was no misnomer. 

Benguella, fifteen miles north of Catumbella, was joined 
to Catumbella by means of a small, single line of railway, 
and an iron bridge, and in early days if the trip was accom- 
plished in three hours we were well satisfied. Like most 
West Coast towns Benguella was built on a sand-belt close 
to the sea, and was therefore unhealthy, malarious, and 
fever-stricken. Most of the houses, government buildings, 
and traders' stores were built of adobe, or sun-dried bricks, 
and covered by corrugated iron, or thatched roofs. The 
walls of these were usually from two to three feet thick, 
which, despite the intense heat outside, kept the interior 
cool. Some of these buildings have stood for over a 
hundred years, and in the early days when natives from the 
interior made raids on the coast town to plunder the 
traders, those thick walls, which were loopholed, served as 
fortresses, and many an epic story could be told of a hand- 
ful of traders putting up a stiff fight against overwhelming 
hordes of savages. 

Angola has been known to Europeans from the fifteenth 
century, and the Portuguese have been living and trading 



Dead Man's Land 19 



there for three hundred years, though — with the exception 
of two or three explorers — they have rarely ventured far 
inland. 

There is only one Portuguese known to us who has 
travelled far, and traded widely in the interior of Africa ; 
his name is Silva Porto. The story of his romantic life as 
I have heard it told round the camp fires again and again 
by notorious old slave-traders who travelled with him, and 
others at the coast who knew him, would fill a portly 
volume, and his unique abilities were well worthy of a 
better cause. As a boy, about seventy years ago, he stowed 
himself away on board an old sailing ship from Lisbon, 
and during the slow voyage was made to work, helping the 
cook in the galley. On reaching Benguella he went ashore, 
and from there made his way inland with a native caravan 
to Bihe, 150 miles from the coast. There he established 
himself, and founded a trading station and colony at 
Belmonte, which eventually became the Government 
headquarters. He set himself to collect caravans with 
which he travelled all over the interior, trading. Then, 
trade goods, firearms, and rum were cheap, and much 
sought after by the natives. Slaves, ivory, beeswax, and 
gum copal were abundant, and to be had for next to 
nothing. As a consequence, in a short time he became 
incredibly wealthy, and was highly respected by both the 
King and the people of Bihe, with whom he lived on the 
best of terms. By and by the Portuguese authorities 
having decided on the effectual occupation of the country, 
brought up a large force, which was attacked by the King 
with an army. The King was subsequently defeated, 
made a prisoner and deported to the Cape Verde Islands 
where he died in exile. I saw him there when returning 
to Africa twenty years ago. He wore an old silk hat and 
frock coat, and standing among some of his exiled elders 



20 Dead Man's Land 



as he spoke to me, he looked every inch a king. Old Silva 
Porto was so worried over the failure of the Government 
to pacify the country, and his own political part in it, that 
he gathered together and piled up all his gunpowder in 
the centre of his house, and, wrapping himself in the 
Portuguese flag, he blew himself and his house to pieces. 

From the two coast towns of Benguella and Catumbella 
two great caravan routes bifurcated into the interior. One 
ran S.E. via Kakonda towards the Barotse hinterland, and 
S.S.E. to the great horse-breeding and cattle-raising 
country of the Tunyama. The other stretched east over 
the hills from Catumbella to Bihe and the far interior. 

This latter is the route I followed in my three journeys 
from one side of Africa to the other. Here at the coast 
one met during occasional visits many of the " black-ivory " 
hunters, as the Portuguese then styled themselves. 

One of the most typical, and by far the most interesting 
old-time slave and ivory traders of Catumbella was a jolly 
fat Dutchman named " old Pete," manager of the " Dutch 
house." He not only lived, but thrived in the steamy, 
sweltering coast towns, despite dinners which lasted two 
to three hours daily, plus unlimited vinho tinto and rum, 
and a frequent forty to eighty grain dose of quinine. I 
have seen his book-keeper come rolling out of his room, 
and, staggering from side to side of the passage like a 
drunken man, he would say : " Ah, Mr. Campbell, dat 
man vill kill us all." " What is it, Mr. Kortekaas ? " I 
would ask. " Ah, he be shust gif me eighty grains of 
quinine one dose." Old Pete was, like most of the early 
travellers and traders, something of a doctor, dentist, and 
Jack-of-all-trades rolled into one, and there was nothing 
that he would hesitate to attempt. I remember seeing him 
one day in the backyard with a rough pair of old dental 
forceps pulling a suffering Portuguese about by the mouth, 



Dead Man's Land 21 



the latter howling with pain and hanging on to him with 
both hands, but unable to get free of the forceps until the 
tooth came out. He used to take great pleasure in scaring 
new-comers by pointing out enormous, long, fat cock- 
roaches that trooped out of the wall-cracks during dinner 
in the evening, and saying : " Ah, that is a mosquito. 
That is a jigger ! " " But," asked a young lady missionary, 
" how could such a great creature get into one's toe ? " 
" Ah veil, shust vait, Miss, shust vait and you shall see." 
He was hospitality personified, though he was never 
scrupulous about recouping himself at the first oppor- 
tunity, and adding it to our accounts. Like most Hollanders 
I have met on the coast, he spoke fluently nearly every 
European and African language required. I have seen 
German, Portuguese, French, Dutch, English, and native 
travellers and traders at dinner, when Pete would enter- 
tain them all in their various languages with his inex- 
haustible fund of stories acquired during over thirty years 
on the West Coast. 

The Benguella of to-day is of infinitesimal importance, 
having been superseded by Lobito Bay, which is probably 
the finest seaport round the coast of Africa, with a magni- 
ficent bay. I remember twenty-nine years ago rolling about 
on the sea in front of the glaring walls of the old customs 
house at Benguella in an old rat-eaten steamer, when 
almost within sight of our ship — a few miles away — this 
same natural seaport stretched out its inviting arms. Later, 
on my return there in 1899, I drove out to the bay in a 

mule cart with my fat friend Pete K . Nothing was 

visible round the beach save a few squalid fishing hamlets, 
close to which, bobbing in the bay, were to be seen a 
number of dugouts manned by ragged natives, who, after 
supplying their own needs, sold the remainder of their 
fish in the open market of Catumbella. 



22 



Dead Man's Land 



Here at the coast one met members of a hundred 
different tribes speaking as many different dialects. The 
local tribes speak mostly the three principal coast dialects : 
Kimbundu, Umbundu, and Portuguese. 

All other natives east of the Kwanza River on the Bihe 
border are called by their more civilised coast neighbours 
Gangellas, a term of reproach meaning " heathen," and 
are considered as fit only to be slaves. 

Crimes and murders were of common occurrence around 
here, and low- type traders frequently plundered native 
caravans of their rubber, ivory, etc. If the native took his 
case to the Fort there was seldom any redress, for, alas ! 
too often the local authority was in league with his friend 
the trader. " Nos somos aqui far a encher as algibeiras" " we 
are here to fill our pockets," I have been told by officials 
on many an occasion. I once compelled one of these 
sharks to disgorge and restore a load of rubber he had 
stolen from one of my carriers ; there were, however, some 
decent Europeans to whom the native trader took his 
goods year after year and by whom he was treated fairly. 

As I have said, crime and bullying were generally 
encouraged by the Portuguese. I have watched a group 
of traders standing at their store doors with arms akimbo, 
or holding their fat sides in hilarious laughter, at two 
Ndombe natives, to whom they had given rum, and long 
sticks, and who were belabouring each other viciously 
while the blood flowed freely from their heads and bodies. 
They were goaded to this for the sake of the rum and 
money they were given by these civilised lovers of the 
noble art. Strolling out at night, as I used to do, one 
frequently heard howls and cries proceeding from traders' 
backyards where slaves were being flogged, and I have been 
shown spots in the yards where there had been buried 
slaves who had been murdered for " bad conduct " or for 



Dead Man's Land 



23 



" disobedience." Close to the town on the west side I 
passed the dambo Maria where poor half-caste Mary had 
been murdered by her paramour, and a walk of an hour or 
so on foot over the hills would take one to heaps of bleach- 
ing bones and skulls of slaves who had been left to die, or 
been done in because they were of no value at the coast 
and not worth taking back inland, and the owner would 
allow no one else to derive profit from his slaves. 

If you had travelled up with me from Catumbella to 
Bihe you would have got sufficient evidence to convince 
you that the negro who coined the name of " dead man's 
land " for the West Coast made no mistake. The first 
day's travel over the hills was a revelation to a new-comer ; 
bodies lying about here and there in the open in various 
stages of decomposition, and others lying about in the huts 
built by travellers which, however inclement the weather, 
one shunned with horror, preferring the company of a live 
hyena or a lion to those foul-smelling slave corpses ; full- 
length skeletons also, days, months, weeks, and years old, 
skulls and vertebrae, leg and arm bones, etc., lying loose on 
each side of the road, or in little heaps. At the first camp 
we reached, a slave hunt was in progress, but, as the slave 
ran into our camp and sought our protection, the hunters 
with their dogs and guns had to return to Catumbella 
without their quarry. 

On we go inland from day to day, with similar experi- 
ences ; slave camps and caravans meet us on every hand, 
convincing us, if proof be needed, that slavery is a real, 
live, going concern under the white man's flag in " dead 
man's land." I am writing of my experiences twenty- 
eight and even twenty years ago. 

On our way up to Bailundu and Bihe we pass through the 
Humbe country, a splendid pastoral district where are large 
herds of cattle, though the natives are loth to sell their 



24 Dead Man's Land 



stock. This is also called by travellers " the goitre country," 
as a large number of the people are afflicted with Derby- 
shire neck, and for this they wear thick, heavy brass wire 
collars. On the ninth or tenth day we reach Bailundu, 
beyond which a tramp of a few days more brings us to the 
highlands of Bihe, 5000 to 6000 feet above sea-level. Here 
domestic animals thrive, even horses, and European fruits 
and vegetables do well, and it is not uncommon during 
the cold season to find ice ^-inch thick on the water. This 
is the natural boundary of the west coastlands. This 
country is inhabited by a hardy race called Ovimbundu, 
who are enterprising traders, and used often to go far into 
the interior of Africa for two or three years at a time 
trading. They are the Arabs of West Central Africa. 

Here in Bihe I spent my first two years and acquired a 
thorough knowledge of the language. The method I 
adopted was to live in a native village and listen to the 
natives speaking among themselves. Also, on every avail- 
able occasion, I attended the native law courts where the 
best Bantu was always in evidence. Sometimes a lawsuit 
would take weeks to thrash out, and as a general rule good 
native advocates and orators only would be permitted to 
speak. There one found unique opportunities for getting 
at the back of the black man's mind. Thousands of proverbs, 
clear and obscure, besides idioms and legal instances both 
recent and several generations old, would be quoted. Songs 
ancient and modern, customs and laws in vogue and obso- 
lete, would all be called into requisition at such times ; 
this, added to the bamboozling paraphernalia of native 
law-courts, and intricacies of native law, were beyond the 
heroic attempts of ear, pencil, and notebook, to record. 
However, I have never had cause to regret that I took 
such an amount of pains and trouble to acquire my first 
native language. That one particular language has proved 



Dead Man's Land 25 

a key to the opening up of the archives of every other 
language I have since mastered. 

The native doctors and diviners that one met at every 
turn in Bihe, and of whom, and whose language in those 
young days I understood so little, provided me with one 
of the most fascinating and all-engrossing studies of native 
life and thought. The field of their operations, and all 
their un-European modus operandi, has to do with the real 
" dead man's land " of Africa — the world of spirits. The 
unity of the negro race, living and dead, past and present, 
is the great doctrine taught and enunciated, by those 
masters of the Black and the White art — The devil doctors 
of Bantuland. 



CHAPTER II 



The Slave Trade 

SLAVERY is one of the world's oldest institutions 
and was recognised by Jews, Mohammedans and 
the early Christian Church. When missionaries 
argued with Tipu Tib and his hordes on Tanganyika, or 
with the black Biheans of Angola, Abraham was quoted and 
Europeans pointed to as the original cause and promoters 
of export slavery. Slavery was recognised by law and pre- 
cedent until less than one hundred years ago, and it is only 
within the last few decades that the world's conscience has 
been roused and slavery become branded as execrable and 
incompatible with our modern standards of civilisation. 
From time immemorial Arabs and Biheans have gone into 
the interior from the East and West Coasts to supply the 
markets of Islam and Christendom. Barter goods were 
carried with which to trade, such as rum, guns, gunpowder, 
etc. They also carried wherever they went a veneer of 
civilisation, and they, not missionaries, were the first bearers 
of the Koran and the Crucifix to the untutored natives of 
inland Africa. Though I have been in touch with and lived 
amongst the scenes of slavery as carried on by Arabs and 
Rugaruga from the Congo to Lake Nyasa, my chief and 
most intimate experiences, gained at first hand, have been 
acquired while travelling between Catumbella and Katanga 
in company with West Coast slave caravans and traders. 
For months on end I have been a daily witness of the 
horrors of this vile traffic, while powerless to do anything 
towards putting an end to it or mitigating it in any way. 

26 



The Slave Trade 27 

It must be borne in mind that slaves were classified in 
different categories, and that all slaves did not necessarily 
represent poor innocent, downtrodden humanity. Some of 
the slaves disposed of were sold on account of crimes com- 
mitted, and these represented, as a rule, the incorrigible 
class of recidivists who in Europe would have been sentenced 
to sweat out the remainder of their lives in the galleys, or 
on the treadmill. I have on occasions redeemed several of 
this type, and in every instance have regretted it. This type 
of slave is bad and, generally speaking, not worth the twenty 
or thirty yards of calico paid for his (or her) redemption. 
Shakespeare's Blackamoor in Titus Andronicus is a real live 
picture of some of these I have known. One I knew actu- 
ally did mutilate a woman, and another dug up a newly 
filled-in grave and stripped the dead woman's body of ivory 
bracelets, cutting off the hands and feet to do so. Another 
I knew in the Katanga. . . . Well, the Congo law had 
evidently no means of punishing such cases ! Of course, 
African chiefs do not understand our incarceration methods 
of punishment, and so adopt that of graded mutilations or 
enslavement. What Van Diemen's Land was to Britain, 
and parts of Angola were to Portugal, so the West and East 
Coasts, too, came to be looked upon by African chiefs — a 
land of exile for their criminals and undesirables, and slave 
caravans the ships to carry them there. Of course, those 
taken in war, or raids, represented a mixed class, but the 
larger percentage were of the slave element. The coming 
of each fresh caravan with guns and gunpowder meant war 
and raids, killing, burned villages, and devastated countries. 
Many of the once populous countries round the Katanga : 
e.g. Luba, Lamba, Lala, etc., as well as thickly peopled 
corners of N.E. and N.W. Rhodesia are thinly peopled 
to-day because of raids to procure slaves to supply the 
Angola markets. 



28 The Slave Trade 



The first slave caravan with which I travelled from Bihe 
to Msidi's country, in the Katanga, was composed of some 
three hundred slave traders. The men who carried my 
loads were all of the budding slave trader type, or slave 
traders down on their luck, who, with the wages I gave 
them for the trip, would trade and return rich in slaves 
and ivory. I have seen a slave caravan of about three 
thousand men which broke up into several camps for 
convenience, but which held together for protection from 
extortionate or quarrelsome natives by the way. I have 
seen slaves bought in the interior for next to nothing. A 
young boy or girl could be bought for four yards of calico, or 
a handful of gunpowder and a few percussion caps. Full- 
grown men and women were sold for eight to twelve yards 
of calico. Babies were considered of no value but rather a 
drug on the market, as they prevented the mother from 
carrying a load of rubber or ivory. Sometimes they would 
spear the child or give it a knock on the head with an axe 
or club. Rubber and ivory had first consideration. 

On buying a slave the usual mode of procedure was a& 
follows : the slave after purchase was thrown on the 
ground, generally knocked about a bit to emphasise the 
new master, then roped and shackled. If a young man, 
he had his neck put in a heavy forked stick ; sometimes a 
stick with a fork at each end would be used to hold two. 
Women were merely roped waist to waist or neck to neck 
during the daytime, but at night wooden shackles were 
put on their hands and feet, and they slept with these on 
till the morning, when the peg in the shackles between the 
two hands and feet was knocked out, and they were free 
for work and travel. 

Bihe, Benguella, and Catumbella were the principal 
slave markets of that part of Angola where I lived. Slaves 
brought from the interior were usually, though not always, 



The Slave Trade 29 



kept a year in Bihe and fattened up before being taken 
down to the coast to be sold. Many slaves were disposed of 
in Bihe to traders, or kept by the Biheans for domestic 
purposes. Often the slave, if ruffianly disposed, developed 
into a full-fledged trader, and many such I knew who could 
beat their masters at the game. When put into any 
position of trust in the caravan, as a rule, the ex-slave 
was more cruel and merciless than his quondam master, 
and the shikote, " hippo whip," was his inseparable com- 
panion. At Catumbella high prices were given for healthy 
young slaves, some bringing from .£15 to £30. I have seen 
the slave market in full swing at the West Coast and 
traders up against each other for the best slaves. Marfim 
negra, " black ivory," was the trade name as distinguished 
from marfim branca, or " elephant tusk " ! ; when sold and 
shipped to S. Thome, or Principe, they became Services, or 
" contracted servants." On account of the enormous 
demand for slaves for the Cocoa Islands, the human article 
was at a premium for many years, and could only be bought 
inland for guns and gunpowder. Many of these were bought 
from cannibals and from revolted Congo State soldiers, 
who were thus through Portuguese channels supplied with 
arms and ammunition, by means of which they devastated 
the south-western corner of the Congo State, and waged 
war for many years against the authorities. Some of the 
world's best cocoa was grown on the Portuguese islands 
of Sao Thome and Principe on the West Atlantic. The 
same slave-grown cocoa has made some of our great cocoa 
and chocolate manufacturers famous, and produced ameli- 
orated conditions of life and garden cities for the cocoa 
workpeople. What about the cocoa slaves who sweated 
out their lives in bondage under the most cursed conditions 
on the two islands referred to ? On the two occasions 
when I was at home, twenty-one and thirteen years ago, 



30 The Slave Trade 



I lectured wherever I went on the horror of the slave trade, 
and pointed out that every cup of cocoa drunk and every 
cake of chocolate eaten was soaked in the blood of men and 
women. Many were stirred. The Anti-Slavery and 
Aborigines Protection Society took action. Nevinson was 
sent out to investigate, and the result was an exposure 
of many cocoa and chocolate manufacturers who were un- 
consciously and indirectly fostering the slave trade. Then 
C. A. Swan, a missionary and my old colleague, was sent 
as a Commissioner in the interest of cocoa manufacturers 
to give a true account, and the results of his trip and 
investigations are found embodied in his book, The Slavery 
of To-day. I wrote two booklets on slavery describing 
the enslavement of a Luban boy called Goi and a Luban 
woman named Bwanikwa, who had been sold ten times 
by different masters. These were scattered in thousands 
throughout Britain. Much interest was thus created on 
behalf of slaves, and " Cocoa slavery," as it was called, 
brought down upon it the condemnation of every right- 
thinking man and woman who read the story. Some 
offered me money to redeem slaves, others declared a 
boycott of cocoa and chocolate, but more radical measures 
were required, and at last the British Government brought 
pressure to bear on the Portuguese Government, who 
promised great things and eventually did a little. My 
frequent letters from Africa to the Anti-Slavery and 
Aborigines Protection Society had much to do with the 
spasmodic activities of our own Government and the 
eventual black-listing of slavery once for all by the Portu- 
guese authorities. 

I have gone ashore on these islands, visited the plantations 
in the interior, and spoken to slaves there in their own 
tongues, as well as to the planters. Most of these slaves 
hailed from the Congo State and Rhodesia. Sometimes 



The Slave Trade 31 



life on the plantations became so unbearable that the slaves 
attempted to escape into the forests, when man-hunts 
would be organised with guns and dogs, and many were 
shot to strike terror into the hearts of the others. A 
Portuguese steamer from Africa en route to Europe 
with a friend of mine aboard, when within twelve hours' 
steaming from Sao Thome, sighted a capsized boat. The 
weather was rough, and heavy seas running, but they lowered 
a boat which reached the derelict. Two Africans were 
found clinging to it. They were taken on board and after 
care and nourishment told their story. They were slaves 
belonging to a cocoa plantation, and three days before had 
attempted to escape in an open boat. Having no knowledge 
of bearings, they rowed towards the east. They were caught 
by a storm and the boat was capsized. They had passed 
three days clinging to the boat's bottom without food 
before being rescued. I remember seeing a big slave 
caravan on the march at Lake Dilolo with about three 
thousand slaves and slavers all told. It hailed from Luba- 
land, away up in the Congo. Smallpox had broken out 
and was claiming its victims at each camp. The Lunda, 
Luena, and Chokwe tribes, through whose countries they 
were passing, carried off stragglers and laggards, one of 
whom I saw dragged away before my eyes. These man- 
thieves followed caravans like vampires and preyed on the 
sick and slow who were left behind. Great gangs of slaves 
were chained or roped neck to neck, some were in fork 
sticks and shackles, but all had loads of rubber or ivory tied 
to their heads and shoulders. Many were skin and bone, 
others with babies pick-a-back or on the tops of loads ; 
some were in advanced stages of pregnancy, and one had 
given birth to a child by the roadside. These things did 
not delay the great westward-bound stream of slaves. 
Even little children barely able to walk were dragged 



32 The Slave Trade 



or driven alongside the caravan, with' protruding eyes 
and distended stomachs. When they saw me they shrank 
in horror, believing that they had at last reached the 
country of " big devils." White men are called Ovindele, 
or " big devils," and their home Mbonshi, " hell," or " dead 
man's land." In 1886, Livingstone referred to slavery as 
" this trade of Hell "■ — strong words, but nevertheless true. 

Often when burning with a sense of injustice and 
impotence at the cruelty and wicked inhumanity of the 
slave trade I have struck little blows of my own. The first 
of these was when returning from Benguella to Bihe 
after accompanying a sick European to the coast. I was 
riding an ox, and had turned a bend of the path when I 
came face to face with a Mulatto slaver with whip in hand, 
pipe in mouth, and gun on shoulder driving a man-slave 
in front of him in a fork stick. I ordered him to halt, 
and calling for my rifle told him to " knock off that shackle." 
He was slow to do it, so I pushed a cartridge into the breach, 
and in a minute he called out for an axe, hewed the shackle 
to pieces, and the man stood free. " Now," I said to the 
slave, " if you want to go with that man you can do so ; 
you are free. If you want to follow us, I will protect 
you." I need hardly say which course he chose, while I 
kept my rifle on the slaver until he was well out of sight. 
While on a visit to his relatives he had been sold to this 
man for a keg of rum. It is not often natives sell their 
relatives, but rum is responsible for a lot of misery. On 
another occasion in the Congo State I freed two gangs of 
slaves, numbering in all fourteen. This nearly cost me 
my life, for guns were pointed at me from all over the 
slavers' camp. One item in this was touching. I had 
rescued among the first gang a quaint old Lunda man. 
In the second gang rescued was an elderly Lunda woman, 
and when in the evening the two gangs met in my camp, 



The Slave Trade 



33 



to our surprise the old Lunda man ran into the arms of 
the Lunda woman, who turned out to be his wife. After 
the sale they had been separated, having been bought by 
different masters. Both lived with me for many years 
on the Luapula River. The old man was an expert wood- 
carver, and the old woman a potter, and as they had no 
children I gave them a little girl-slave I rescued, who grew 
up in their house and is now married and has a child of 
her own. I sent them back to their own country some 
years ago, and the old man became the Chief of a village 
of freed slaves near to Kalene Hill at the apex of North- 
West Rhodesia. 

The " red road " to the West Coast, as Livingstone called 
it, was littered from end to end with bleaching bones and 
skulls. The " Hungry Country," near Bihe, being the 
end of the long slave road to the interior, was literally white 
with these by the roadside, and as long as these remained 
there was visible proof of Portuguese complicity and guilt. 
As a number of Europeans travelling west from Rhodesia 
saw these, and photographed them, it was necessary that 
there should be a big official sweep-up of the roads. Orders 
were given to this effect, and there was a big " spring 
cleaning " of the Portuguese house from Catumbella to 
Moxiko. 

The " Hungry Cokwe country " was a veritable ossuary, 

literally a chamber of horrors. I have seen bones and 

dead bodies to right and left of the road, and even astride 

it. Invariably we looked to see if the dead slave had been 

hamstrung, or knocked on the head with an axe, one or 

other of which was usually done to prevent their falling 

into other hands. If a slaver showed the least sign of 

humanity he became the laughing-stock of his fellow-traders, 

the butt of their jibes for many a day. Nine years ago the 

Portuguese Government woke up, and one day it issued 
c 



34 The Slave Trade 



an edict freeing all slaves in the Colonies. This resulted 
in a few claiming freedom, and obtaining it, and later 
others followed their example. I have in my possession, 
given me by such a freed slave, a Carta de Liberdade, signed 
by Portuguese officials and witnessed with the slave-owner's 
mark — a most interesting and epoch-making document 
which I wish I could produce here. Many of these ex-slaves 
when freed headed for Lunda and Lubaland. I found a 
number of villages of freed slaves when up there two 
years ago and conversed with them in their own tongue. 
They received permission from the Congo authorities 
to settle and build, but most are more concerned about 
finding their lost relatives than settling down permanently 
anywhere at present. The first effects of freedom are 
manifest in the desire of the slaves to be near those they 
can look up to as masters, hence they are settling round 
European Government posts, and mission stations. The 
slave spirit engendered by a life of bondage will take long 
years to eradicate, and the evil effects of association with 
the slave traffic which has left its cloven mark not only 
on the slave, but on many of the Portuguese and men of 
other nationalities who have engaged in it, will take decades 
to disappear. From the last letter received via Angola it 
appears that there is much room for improvement in the 
official attitude to slavery, and there is evidence obtainable 
that slavery in Angola is not yet as extinct as the Dodo, 
in fact, that it still exists under another name. 

[Note. — This, of course, must be read strictly from the 
historical point of view. I am well aware that, since the 
days referred to, the cocoa and chocolate manufacturers 
in question have done everything in their power to right 
what was wrong, and can truthfully say to-day " Nous 
avons change tout cela.' 3 ] 



CHAPTER III 



Government &* Socialism 

OF the Bantu negroes, who to the casual observer 
seem to have no form of stable government, it 
could be truly said that they are the most exces- 
sively governed race among the world's peoples, as they are, 
chez eux, the most respectful and law-abiding. 

The nominal form of government is by king and a 
council of elders, with district chiefs and village headmen. 
The Bantu idea of king, as among the Teutons of barbarous 
times, is, the man who can. For this reason, one has seen 
again and again an interloper, by a swift State stroke brush- 
ing all law aside and killing a weakling, seize the throne and 
establish himself, to the people's satisfaction and his* own, 
as their king. Thereupon he is accepted with little demur, 
and, like Msidi and many others, quickly inaugurates his 
reign by putting to death all who oppose him or are likely 
to do so. At the same time he will call to his side powerful 
blood relations to whom he will give chieftainships, doing 
the same also to such other powerful men as, from interested 
or mercenary motives, will lay their guns at his feet. 
Another Bantu view of government is that the king is the. 
man who provides. A king who fails to recognise the 
fundamental law of savage life, namely, that a native 
population, like Napoleon's army, marches on its stomach, 
is certain to meet an untimely end. 

Every native king must attend to cultivation and provide 
bread and beer for his people, and show them, as well by 

35 



36 Government Socialism 



example as precept, how it must be done. In the hoeing 
season from sunrise to sunset all chiefs may be seen in the 
fields with their people, and often, as in Rhodesia, they 
vacate their villages and live for months at a stretch out in 
their fields, digging and planting. At such times the king's 
wives brew quantities of beer, and make food, and the 
people come to dine and drink after work at the great bark 
beer-bins. I have seen three such great bark casks, 4 feet 
high by 2 feet wide, full of strong millet beer, and the 
people sitting around, chatting, drinking, and singing. 
Often with drum and song and the chief at their head, 
long lines of people would be seen in the fields during the 
early part of the cultivating season, hoeing and singing, 
keeping time with the music, their hoes rising and falling 
to the beat of the drum and the words of the song : 

" In our country there'll be hunger, 
In the Katanga there'll be hardship. 
Raise your hoe high, my boys, 
Dig down, dig deep, my boys." 

Again and again elephant and big-game hunters arrogate 
to themselves headships of villages and districts by obtain- 
ing a following as the result of success in the chase. These 
are good shots, usually brave, good soldiers, and being able 
also to protect the people from wild beasts and enemy 
raids, and provide them with wealth and cloth from ivory 
sold, they become popular leaders. 

A king will not readily refuse a chieftainship to a hunter 
of repute whose ivory brings trade and wealth to the 
country and cloth to his people, besides guns and gun- 
powder. These men, however, often become arrogant and 
cause much trouble. In times of famine when ordinary 
people are starving, the population of a Nimrod district 
or village are found sleek and well fed. This causes 



Government & Socialism 37 



ill-feeling, and I have known a trumped-up case of witch- 
craft brought against such a hunter, which case ended in 
his being tried, sentenced, and burned to death. 

There are tribes like the Wemba and Matabele, who, in 
pre-European days, lived by gun and spear, but to-day, all 
these warrior clans have had to beat their spears and battle- 
axes into agricultural implements, and be content to hoe 
their peaceful furrow. The u spear-boundary " was the 
only original and recognised frontier of Bantuland, hence 
to-day the perpetual squabbles over local frontiers that 
have to be settled annually at Indabas in each adminis- 
trative district by the Administrator of Northern Rhodesia. 
The Arab boast that " only the gun is king in Africa " 
corresponds with Pringle's song in " The Emigrant's Cabin 
at the Cape " a hundred years ago. 

" The death-fraught firelock in my hand, 
The only law of the desert land." 

Mushroom kingdoms like the Yeke kingdom of the 
Katanga existed all over Africa, half a century being the 
usual length of each settled form of government ; but 
within each the same laws of inheritance and succession 
always obtained, and dynasties here and there can go back 
over a long succession of kings and legal successors, e.g. the 
Wemba and Lunda of Northern Rhodesia. 

In different countries and during different years the 
forms of taxation imposed were not always the same. But 
labour, viz. cultivation or help in building, was a form of 
tax that never varied. Once a year each sub-chief had to 
send or take to the capital his quota of men to help to till 
the king's gardens and later to fence them. When the 
site for a new capital was chosen and building about to 
commence, each headman had to send a stated number of 
men — the number being fixed by the chief, according to 



38 Government <@f Socialism 



the population, to help in building the chief's kraal. The 
king claimed all ivory, plus a leg of each animal killed, with I 
the titbits, viz. kidneys, liver, and heart. The king would 
sometimes send for a marriageable daughter of an under- 
chief or headman. Such a marriage would confer higher 
status and favours on the father-in-law. If the king saw a 
pretty girl when on a visit to his villages, or heard of one, 
he would send for her and make her his wife, to which there 
could be no refusal. Hoe-making districts would be taxed 
in a certain number of hoes. Fishing districts would pay 
a tax in fish, and oil-producing districts were taxed in oil. 
All taxes were in kind, which was the only currency. 
Mafuta, " oil," also signified " wages," from the verb 
futOy " to pay," just as " salary " originally meant " an 
allowance of salt." Lion and leopard skins were claimed as 
Royal Property. 

The army was made up of units under local captains, 
batzvale, sent from each district throughout the country. 
There was also the king's particular regiment made up of 
the pick of the young men, who usually married and lived 
round the chief's kraal (musumba) to be in readiness for 
emergency. In war, and for defence, a citizen army was 
formed of every able-bodied man. Women were expected 
to do all the provisioning, and many used to follow the 
men into the field as wives and carriers. To equip and arm 
his soldiers the king had to sell his ivory, lion and leopard 
skins, with slaves and all else of marketable value. Guns 
and gunpowder, with flints and percussion caps, were 
bought up in peace time, and in time of war these were 
handed out to the soldiers. A special head-dress was usually 
worn, and sometimes red shawls. The Angoni soldiers 
wore feather busbies, and officers had distinguishing 
marks. Msidi's people in war adopted red caps or turbans J 
by which they knew each other in battle. Every one con- 



Government &? Socialism 39 



tributed to the upkeep of the fighting-men, and in time of 
war there was little respect shown for private property. 
Even the king's kraal and wives were not immune at such 
times. From time to time as caravans of trade goods 
arrived, these were bought, and the lion's share handed 
over to be divided among the king's army. When travelling 
through their own country, or that of friendly tribes, the 
army was quartered on the villages, which had to supply 
them with food and drink. In wars of offence they sup- 
plied their own needs wherever they went by plunder and 
pillage. In war-time all soldiers were not at liberty to go, 
but a regiment was chosen, and officers appointed, by the 
king, who attended to all important matters in propria 
persona. Protection was granted with all the power at the 
king's disposal to every one of his subjects, provided they 
kept within the limits of the law. In cases of sorcery, 
adultery, or murder, a man put himself outside the pale 
of the law, and therefore forfeited the law's protection. 
Sometimes a chief went to war to protect a single subject 
who had been kidnapped or treated badly by one or more 
of a neighbouring tribe. When the Belgians arrived to 
take over Msidi's country they found it already broken up 
owing to Msidi's stubborn refusal to hand over his court 
orator and favourite, named Kasanda, who was held 
responsible by the Sanga people for the murder of one of 
their women. The man in question was only indirectly 
responsible, in that he owned a slave who in a drunken 
bout seized a gun and shot the woman. The relatives, 
through their chief, demanded the slave's master to be 
handed over for execution, which Msidi refused. He 
protected Kasanda, and this brought about the guerilla 
warfare that ended in his downfall. Each member of a 
family, village, clan, and tribe, claims and obtains the 
protection of his fellows, this being the law of the land. 



4-o Government &* Socialism 



" My country right or wrong " is certainly and funda- 
mentally African law. Negro respect for authority is 
proverbial, but the said authority must have solid support 
at the back of it, for the element of power is omnipotent 
in the savage mind. As Kipling makes little Kim say, " A 
big stick is a good reason." England lost the Katanga 
because Mr. Alfred Sharpe, who was sent to make a treaty 
with Msidi, turned up at Bunkeya Capital without a force 
to support his claim to be England's representative. 

The Bantu proverb runs, " When the lion's dead the game 
can go where they like." The lion, to the negro mind, 
personifies law and authority as he moves about, the 
animals have got to be careful and not get in his way, but 
to keep to the beaten game path. Thus the negro has 
tremendous respect for the power that can make itself 
felt. In the good old days he was kept in his place by ear- 
cropping, eye-gouging, nose-slitting, lip-removing, hand- 
lopping, and many other forms of legal corporal punish- 
ment that had great power in the land as deterrents of 
crime. The thought of a spear-thrust through his feet 
for spitting in a public place, or a spear-thrust through his 
heart for insulting another man's wife, made him an out- 
and-out respecter of law and order. The loud-mouthed, 
blustering, over-dressed, and noisy-mannered negro that 
one meets in the streets of Johannesburg or Elisabethville 
to-day is not the product of native law or village life, but, 
wholly and solely, the outcome of contact with our modern 
civilisation. The negro fresh from the kraal sets himself 
at once to understand the European and does not always 
wholly fail, but how many Europeans take half an hour's 
trouble to study and try to understand the negro ? We 
have him in our houses as servant, we use him as cook, thus 
putting our life in his hands, we use him as nurse-boy for 
our children and run the risk of the moral contamination 



Government &* Socialism 41 



of our families. We use him as store and office boy, where 
he often learns — by opportunity — how to steal and forge 
cheques with impunity. We use him in a hundred different 
ways, and yet we are indifferent as to his character, and do 
not even trouble ourselves intelligently to know where he 
goes at night, or what he does outside house, store, or 
office hours. Is it therefore to be wondered at that he 
becomes vicious and bad under our tutelage ? Let us once 
and for all recognise and remember that the native is not 
naturally lawless, but has an inborn respect for law and 
authority. The native is also a born humorist and, how- 
ever ridiculous it may seem, his whole idea and code of 
censorship of morals, public and private, is wrapped up in 
the sharp sayings and witty warnings of the court and 
village jester, who from time to time dons the motley. 

As it was in the days of Aristophanes and the early 
Greek drama, so it is in Central Bantuland. Under the 
cap-and-bells are exposed civic corruption and sharp 
practices. The court jester is a Government official, and 
he has power to rebuke even the king in public, and warn 
him that if he doesn't behave and govern well, the people 
who made can unmake him. The language he uses is, 
unfortunately, somewhat indecorous and unparliamentary, 
unfit for a European drawing-room, but it is well under- 
stood by the nude people for whose ears it is intended, and 
the king has to take it all in good part. The village jester 
performs a similar function for the humbler folk, and many 
a reproof and warning is thrown about, wrapped up in the 
sugar of wit, received amid roars of laughter, and never 
fails to reach its mark. Sarcasm and jest are the two 
sharpest shamboks with which to punish your pachy- 
dermatous negro and will not land you in the law-courts. 

All government is by the will of the people ; whether it 
be the choice and coronation of a king ; the selection of a 



42 Government &* Socialism 



man to fill a new chieftainship ; the framing, proclama- 
tion, and promulgation of a new law ; the removal of the 
village from one site to another ; the declaration of war 
or the acceptance of terms of peace ; everything must be 
put to the poll and come out stamped with the imprimatur 
of the people's will. No permanent form of negro govern- 
ment can exist save that based four square on the people's 
will. Sometimes the people demand a change of king or 
the repeal or change of a law. The king may get wind of 
this and, by accepting the inevitable, retire on a plea of 
old age, weakness, or inability to continue his public func- 
tion, or from some other justifiable reason. He and his 
elders, with the people, may appoint a successor, after 
which he may make his public abdication, handing over 
spear and bow and arrows, with the other paraphernalia 
of chieftainship, and saluting his elders and people as a 
common man, saying : " I'm no longer So-and-so, your 
chief. Behold your chief ! " He then retires from the 
lion skin, the seat of authority, to an adjoining hut where 
he takes up private life, leaving his successor seated there. 
So also with change of laws. It must be discussed, agreed 
to by all, then be proclaimed publicly, and promulgated 
all over the country by public crier. 

The Lunda is one of the greatest colonising tribes known 
in Central Africa. They have to-day three self-governing 
colonies outside their original tribal home at the Matiamvo 
capital. From the centre their pioneers struck east and 
settled in what is to-day Lovaleland and founded colony 
No. i. They then went further east and founded on the 
Lualaba River colony No. 2. They continued still further 
east to Rhodesia and founded colony No. 3 on the Luapula 
River, where they have governed since the seventeenth 
century. They say that the tribal name Lunda means 
" colonist," and comes from the verb ku-lunda, " to add 



Government &> Socialism 43 



to," or " to colonise." Baku-Lundampanga means the 
" annexors of country to country," or simply " the 
colonists." Often, like Msidi, kings have conquered and 
colonised, but to-day the results of their conquests are nil 
and their colonies have either been wiped out or become 
assimilated by the autochthonous peoples. Not so the 
Ba-Lunda ; their colonies stand to-day and have absorbed, 
and still continue to absorb, local elements. It is known, 
and it is their boast, that they have conquered and assimi- 
lated peoples by means of the hoe rather than the spear. 

All Bantu government has not been based on tyranny 
and founded by tyrants, though there have been many 
tyrants, and people have suffered from their tyrannies. 
Mutilation as a legal form of punishment or summary 
execution is not tyranny, for the same existed in England 
up till comparatively recent times. " In 1837 the punish- 
ment of death was removed from about two hundred 
crimes, and it was still left applicable to the same offences 
as were capital at the end of the thirteenth century. 
Pocket-picking was punishable with death until the year 
1808 ; horse-stealing, cattle-stealing, sheep-stealing, steal- 
ing from a dwelling-house, and forgery until 1832 ; letter- 
stealing and sacrilege until 1835 ; rape until 1841 ; robbery 
with violence, arson of dwelling-houses, or sodomy until 
1861." 

Msidi of the Katanga was an undoubted and typical 
tyrant, whose boast to the helpless was : " I'm the world ; 
and there's no escape nor doorway, even Above." Many 
a man and woman so far defied him as to take the one 
doorway of escape from his tyranny. Many a threat of a 
return to earth in vengeance was pronounced by a con- 
demned subject of Msidi. Many a divination test, too, 
proved that the threat had been fulfilled, and that the 
avenger was at work devastating in some direction or 



44 Government &* Socialism 

another as lion, or leopard, or in snake form, and killing 
without mercy. The only cure was to dig up the bones 
of the dead witch or wizard, and burn them publicly, from 
the ashes of which fetish horns would be compounded as 
a protection and prevention against the demon's power. 

Despite the seeming anomaly, all Bantus are pronounced 
socialists, and socialism, I was going to say kingly socialism, 
is their fundamental and fixed form of government. In 
view of the rise everywhere of questions relating to socialism 
and economy, much that is instructive may be gathered 
from a study of existing conditions in the lives of Central 
Africans. The social status of equality observed by the 
primitive peoples of mankind is now the aim and ambition 
of the most highly civilised communities ; and in Central 
Africa we have a complete object lesson before us of the 
result of life under conditions of equality. 

In Bantuland the spirit of enterprise among the people is 
restrained, even crushed, with the constant fear of exciting 
the envy and cupidity of their fellows. For example, one 
who builds a better house than his neighbour will have his 
house pulled down. If a man exerts himself to cultivate, 
breed animals, or amass riches, he courts the enmity of his 
fellows, and becomes doomed to a premature death. One 
of my best headmen was a case in point, and he only saved 
himself by running to the European for protection. Ambi- 
tion to excel, which is such a common attribute of human 
nature, receives no encouragement. Coinciding with this 
we often find the people living in anarchy and ignorance, 
without a constitution as we know it, without a history, 
and without even definitely established habitations. They 
lack even the ambition of conquest, and are content to 
pass their lives in a state of mental atrophy. 

Socialism from the African point of view — like blood 
friendship — is a form of mutual exchange. The Luba 



Government & Socialism 45 



verb ku-pana, " to give," is used in the reciprocal form, 
and means, to give reciprocally. From the native side there 
is no giving without receiving, and the man, black or white, 
who receives without the intention of returning at least 
an equivalent, is looked on as a thief. Hospitality is one of 
the most sacred and ancient customs of Bantuland, and is 
found everywhere until European individualism comes 
along, when " ancient hospitality," as the poet says, is 

" With unceremonious thrift bowed out of doors." 

A native will give his best house and his evening meal to a 
guest, without the slightest thought that he is doing anything 
extraordinary. African Socialism is not one-sided, for if 
the chief receives he has to give. If he is served it is because 
he is servant of all. If I benefit from the Bantu socialistic 
laws I must be prepared to for go my own rights, fields, 
house, and all else for the common good. Bantu socialism 
is not a poor man eating up the wealth of a rich man, but 
each one living, digging, building, hunting, fishing for the 
public weal — all for one, and one for all. 



CHAPTER IV 



Native Laws 

NATIVE law is the sacred synonym of the revealed 
will of the spirits, by keeping and rigidly observing 
which a man ensures to himself success and peace 
in this world and a happy future across the border in 
" dead man's land." The chief's decision may be taken 
for final, but every man has right of appeal to the spirit 
courts, which have the last say. This may take the form of 
the poison cup or any other of the many tests which are 
presided over by the gods, who are considered the final 
arbiters in all matters of legal difficulty. 

Law is the line drawn, a path to walk in, a doctrine to 
be received and obeyed without demur. Two words are 
used — Mushilo and Lijunde. The former means a specific 
" prohibition," " command," and is much used by doctors 
in prohibiting their patients from doing certain things 
that are considered to be injurious, or from eating certain 
foods ; the latter means a law taught and promulgated, 
a doctrine generally understood as to be obeyed, and 
pertaining to the chief and country where it is in force and 
where its sanction obtains. 

To keep a law is equivalent to guarding the said law with 
all the armed forces at the command of the chief and people, 
for in Africa laws are made to be obeyed. It is not enough 
passively to submit to a law, but each is expected to uphold 
and champion the law and to teach and explain it to others. 
To see a law broken and not to take up cudgels to bring the 

46 



Native Laws 47 

guilty to book is often equivalent to condonation and guilt, 
and is punishable. The peculiar verb used for breaking 
a law considers the law as a wall built up across the path, 
and the law-breaker walks bodily through it, or literally 
bores or breaks through the law (kupula mafunde). The 
other word, Mushilo, considers the law as a line drawn, 
or a path to walk in, and to cross that line is to transgress 
or go out of the path. A stronger verb is used, shilula y 
which, while equivalent to " transgress," also means to 
rub out the line, or to nullify the law by tramping on it, 
an act of tribal disloyalty. 

Land laws have been, and still are, one of the perpetual 
sources of tribal warfare. Boundaries are always well 
defined, recognised, and their laws understood among 
natives, and for any chief to encroach on the boundaries 
of another chief, or in any way attempt to remove the 
ancient landmarks, is to wake and unleash the dogs of war. 
(I was waked up in the middle of the night four years ago 
on Bangweulu owing to a fight between two chiefs over the 
attempt of one to encroach on the other's boundary). 
Boundaries may be, but are not always, rivers, mountains, 
or any particular geographical feature. Sometimes a tribe 
occupies both sides of a great river or mountain, and the 
boundary may be a big tree or rock, or gully. 

The land in every instance belongs to and is vested in 
the chief and people, who are only, however, tribal trustees, 
and have no power whatever to sell the land or to alienate 
any of it to any one under any pretence whatever. The 
land is tribalised and belongs to the tribe in perpetuity. 
I have heard an old chief when dying say to his successor 
proudly as he handed over the chieftainship : " Look, I 
have not lost a single stretch of the land entrusted to me ; 
all the boundaries are intact ; see you do likewise and guard 
well our inheritance, the land of our ancestors." Of 



4 8 



Native Laws 



course, where the spear makes the law, all other laws 
become " scraps of paper." Old Msidi used to boast of 
his " spear boundary," and claimed all the countries 
raided by his armies, many of whom, for fear of a second 
visitation, gladly paid tribute, e.g. the Mashukulumbwe 
and Angola natives. 

A man may cultivate as much land as he and his wives 
can hoe, to supply their personal needs, but the land does 
not belong to him and, as already remarked, he may not 
sell a yard of it. All individual land tenure is only tem- 
porary, and holds only so long as the land is used. All land 
is nationalised, and this tribalisation of land system obtains 
all over Bantuland as against the system of individual 
i possession in vogue among European peoples. A form of 
primitive socialism rules among the Bantu peoples, and 
though the individual self-consciousness is not fully de- 
veloped, the clan consciousness is all-powerful. 

Fences are used to keep out pigs and wild animals, but 
not for the purpose of enclosing a private piece of land. 
The land is socialised. 

Property laws exist, and only here does the right of the 
individual assert itself and give him claim to separate 
consideration. A man's field is inviolate, and a thief found 
stealing corn is roughly handled. A most amusing form of 
punishment in force not many years ago, was to take the 
thief with the corn he stole, and dress him up in a corn- 
jacket, and parade him through the village while the mob 
rough-handled him, calling out as they did so, in sarcasm, 
" O come all ye people and see this pretty man with new- 
fashioned corn-jacket." An ordinary case of violation of 
property laws was tried by the chief, but if a man entered 
another's house or field at night to steal, he could be (and 
often was) speared at sight. 

Laws of inheritance and succession form an intricate code, 



Native Laws 49 

many of which seem to point back to an early Semitic 
origin, dating from Arab or Hebrew domination or influence. 
A brother can inherit a dead brother's wives and goods, 
and failing a brother a nephew is chosen to succeed the 
deceased. Among some tribes like Yeke the son can inherit 
and may take over all the father's wives save his own mother. 
The inheritance ceremonies are elaborate, and the festivities 
often last for weeks, during which great quantities of food 
and beer are consumed. Drumming and dancing are kept 
up night and day, and there is great rejoicing and general 
jollification. 

Laws of war exist in name only, for the chief object 
of both parties is to get in the hardest blow first. Very 
often he who draws first blood is considered the victor, 
as was the law among the clans of Scotland. If a chief is 
taken prisoner he is frequently kept as a hostage and, on 
professions of loyalty, willingness to pay tribute and help 
to fight the conqueror's battles, he gets a new name and 
insignia of chieftainship, and is reinstated among his people 
as a friend and ally. He and his people are henceforth 
treated well and receive a new status. 

" Thou shalt not steal " was not brought to Africa as 
an article of the Decalogue and taught for the first time 
by missionaries. There are five different verbs in every-day 
use to describe forms of stealing, and all with different 
shades of meaning : 

Ku-tola, to pick up (what is not your own). 

Ku-bula, to take (other people's things). 

Ku-fiompola, to pilfer. 

Ku-iba, to steal. 

Ku-sompa, to plunder. 
There was Jabiri, my old Arabic teacher, who " only 
borrowed," or, when caught, said so. His name was 
Kopakopa, " the man who only borrowed." He stole a 

D 



5° 



Native Laws 



fowl and ate it, but when found out said he was going off 
to buy another to replace it. When found wearing another 
man's shirt he said, as he went and brought it back, " Please, 
I only borrowed it." No mercy was ever shown to a thief 
when caught. A man will disown his own son or brother 
if caught, but will share the booty if not found out. I 
remember some Bihean traders in camp in Lovaleland. 
One of their number woke up in the middle of the night 
to find that a Luena man had got through the doorway 
unperceived and had his arm round a load of guns. The 
trader quietly stretched out his hand and, seizing his axe, 
raised it and pinned the thief through the back. The 
camp was roused and, bringing firewood, axe and hoe handles 
they soon had the midnight robber on the burning pile. 
He was burned to death. In the same connection a queer 
thing happened just about the same time to a trader. As 
there had been many scares and night thefts in the camps 
along the road, each Bihean kept his axe handy by his 
bedside. The man in question, who lived near me when I 
was in Bihe, had been sleeping with his one leg raised, 
propped against a post in the hut, with the result that the 
leg became " dead." In the dark hours he woke up suddenly 
to see what looked in the dark like a man in his hut. He 
speedily seized his axe and raising it behind his head brought 
it down with full force, cutting through his own knee, 
which he had mistaken for a robber. He was carried 
home to Bihe in a hammock, where he lived, in the village 
of Kwanjulula, hobbling around with a stick. This killing 
of a robber was the law of the road. 

Prior to European government, a man had his hands and 
ears cut off for theft. In the Wemba country this severe 
form of punishment was only meted out to those who stole 
from the chief. In other countries any criminal stealing 
from anybody was mutilated by the cutting off of hands 



Native Laws 



5i 



or ears. Sometimes a thief was enslaved and sold to 
Arabs or Biheans. Sometimes heavy fines in kind were 
imposed and paid. No stealing was winked at, and if a man 
was suspected, and denied the theft, tortures were resorted 
to in order to make him confess. 

Assault was always punishable, and these cases were 
dealt with by the chief or headman at the local courts. 
As a rule the man who " started " the quarrel was fined, 
and had to pay a basket of fowls, a goat, a sheep, or a number 
of hoes. On account of this law it was common to hear the 
defence pleaded : " Chief and gentlemen of the court, 
this man started me " {want end eh a). If the assault was 
repeated after warning the person was sent away to a distant 
village. 

Adultery laws were one throughout Bantuland in this 
respect, that the husband would be justified if he killed 
the aggressor, which was the reason why he was given an 
arrow at marriage with the words pronounced by the 
bride's father : u This is to kill the seducer of your wife." 
Among the Wemba a man would be fearfully mutilated 
for adultery with a chief's wife. Sometimes all his relatives 
also would be mutilated, even his mother. Eyes picked out 
with the thumb and removed with fish-hooks, or bored 
out with antelope horns, or simply extracted by means of the 
strong finger of the executioner boring into the eye-sockets 
were common occurrences among the people of Bembaland. 
Sometimes the woman was killed or mutilated, the breasts 
being cut off. The chief Kafwimbe on the Luapula was 
notorious for this form of punishment to women. Of 
course, most of those so mutilated died afterwards in a 
very short time. Of one of those mutilated women who 
lived and recovered there is an old song still sung. She was 
the headwife of the chief Mwimuna, who went to make war 
on the aforesaid Kafwimbe ; the latter, however, fore- 



52 



Native Laws 



stalled him by attacking his village, catching his queen 
and cutting off her ears and breasts. The words of the 
song roughly translated are : 

" O Mwimuna who went to war, 
With your flintlocks against Kafwimbe, 
Look behind you and see your queen, 
They've cut her ears and breasts off." 

Arson laws are strict. If a man burnt down another man's 
corn bin he had to replace the corn destroyed and build a 
new bin. If a man burned another man's house he had to 
build a new house and replace the goods, or pay the value 
of the goods destroyed. If a man burned another's fence 
and field of corn he had to build a new fence and pay over 
a larger field of food. If a man set fire to a house and the 
whole village caught fire and was burned, the man was 
enslaved with all his relatives. These were the laws of 
accidental burning. If any of these were done with 
malicious intent and forethought the matter was more 
serious. The man was flogged and beaten, and had to 
pay up heavy fines in goods and stock as well as court fees, 
and had to replace the bin, house, or fence burned. If a 
village was destroyed both he and his people were enslaved 
and liable to be sold to the first slave caravan that arrived. 

Laws of murder, like the other laws, were rigidly enforced, 
and not even natural affection was allowed to interfere 
with the cause of justice. I knew a witch doctor who 
condemned his own mother and then was the first to drive 
an axe into her body to prove that he had no sympathy 
with, or complicity in, the act for which she was burned. 
If a man with intent kills a man, he is executed. If a man 
kills a woman he is killed and his sister enslaved to raise up 
children to the dead woman. I knew a case of a man 
who for adultery followed his wife to her field, killed her, 



Native Laws 



53 



and cut her into pieces. Trie murderer fled to the forest 
and hid in a thicket, but he was followed by the dead 
woman's brother and killed. But for the presence of a 
Government official a blood feud would have ensued ; the 
murderer's relatives would have been killed also, and his 
two sisters enslaved. If a man kills a man accidentally 
he has to pay a heavy fine. If a man says to another, 
" Let's go out fishing," but the man refuses, and the 
other in the presence of witnesses presses him to go, 
and while they are on the river or lake the canoe is capsized, 
and the man who suggested the journey escapes, he is held 
guilty of murder, and executed as a criminal. 

If a man marries and his wife dies in childbirth, he is 
held guilty of murder, but being only a man he is not equal 
to a woman, and his sister is killed instead. (This is under 
the African law of potential motherhood). 

Laws relating to witches and wizards, who are treated as 
murderers, are amongst the most vital of the whole Bantu 
code. These people are recognised as being anti-social ; 
their practices cut at the root of tribal life and unity. 
" Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live," is a fixed law in 
force throughout all Bantuland. For witchcraft only one 
form of punishment was meted out, and that was the 
death penalty. Witchcraft, or black magic, is prohibited 
all over Africa. One of the main difficulties for Europeans 
lies in this : that witchcraft and poisoning are apt to be 
looked on as identical. Sometimes a whole family is burned 
with a mother witch, and the only loophole of escape is 
in publicly expressing horror at the mother's wickedness 
and being among the first to hack and cut at her, prior to 
burning. 

Marriage laws are binding, and I have seen many a 
black Darby and Joan struggling on through their marital 
difficulties and incompatibility of temperament, with the 



54 



Native Laws 



oft-repeated snub : " It's just because I married you that 
I continue to live with you." Such a thing as a man taking 
a marriageable girl to his house without a regular betrothal 
and marriage ceremony would be considered a disgrace 
to the relatives and the community. Birth, marriage, and 
death are the three great events of life, amongst which 
marriage holds a central place. 

Divorce laws are at the disposal of all those who can, 
poor or rich, produce legal reasons why they should not 
continue to live together. Repeated adultery on the 
part of the wife, and barrenness on the part of either party, 
are two of the most fruitful causes of divorce. If the girl 
is proved to be at fault the marriage present must be 
returned. If the man is to blame he has to pay up heavily 
to the girl's people. It happens in Africa, as elsewhere, 
that there are sometimes abuses of law and miscarriages 
of justice, but on the whole the law is allowed to take its 
course. Better severe primitive laws than no laws at all. 

Compensation is sometimes paid if a man assaults or insults 
another, often also for adultery and arson. On two 
occasions I had to pay compensation, once when a cow I 
had gored a boy who had been teasing it ; again, when out 
hunting I lit the grass thoughtlessly and a native fence 
round a garden was burned down. I paid the man the price 
of a new fence, and damages to the gored boy's relatives. 
A boy, a girl, a man or woman, as well as a four-footed 
animal, have all a certain fixed money value which is 
decided by law and is used in regulating compensations. 
A woman, or any female animal, has a special potential 
value owing to the inherent power of motherhood, and this 
is taken into consideration in the judgments given and in 
the settling up of lawsuits. 

Fines are paid into court for court fees, and fixed com- 
pensations have to be laid at the chief's feet to be examined, 



Native Laws 



55 



to see if the amounts are correct before being handed over 
to the person indemnified. " An eye for an eye, and a 
tooth for a tooth " is the Medo-Persic law all over Bantu- 
land. If there is one thing a negro does not understand it 
is European philanthropy, which he does not believe in, 
and if there is one other thing he does believe in it is 
blindfolded justice. The story is told of a man (and many 
such could be told) who gave his boy three shillings more 
a month with the remark, " That is because you have done 
well recently." The boy looked at the money and then at 
his master. " What is the matter ? " said the master, 
surprised. " Please, sir," said the boy, " you still owe me 
fifteen shillings for the past five months' work." " What 
do you mean ? " " Well, sir," said the boy, " I'm not 
worth more to-day than I was then ; you are trying to rob 
me." 

Punishments are innumerable and every new chief or 
slave trader gloried in inventing a new form of punishment. 
If a man was a good hunter he sometimes had his eyes taken 
out by his chief to prevent his ever killing game for any other 
chief. If a man showed musical talent he was similarly 
treated so that he could never play far away from the chief's 
hearing. More will be said on this subject in the chapter 
on " Cruel Customs." There are thousands of Neros in 
Africa. However, as all punishments were intended to be 
preventive, and there were no prisons or police, it is 
marvellous how effective this crude system of maintaining 
law and order was in a country where of all countries 
might was right and " gun was king." 

A case at law had first to be heard by the village head- 
man, then taken to the local chief, who, if he failed, sent 
it on for trial at the court of the paramount chief. The 
chief's orator, the accuser and the accused, with witnesses 
and relatives, then went off to the king's kraal. On arrival 



56 



Native Laws 



they were shown huts and received hospitality. No case 
was tried the same day ; they had to sleep. Next day the 
chief's messenger would call to tell them that the court 
was open. They would go, and on arrival fall on their knees 
to greet the chief. When the chief greets them in reply 
they seat themselves and the case proceeds. The accused 
speaks first and states his case. The accuser is called and 
follows. Then the king's orator restates the case to the 
king. After that the local chief's representatives speak, 
then witnesses. The king's orator again restates to the 
king what they have said, and after consultation with his 
elders — if the case is serious — the king speaks again and 
gives his decision. Court fees are paid in with the fines 
imposed. The white chalk acquittal is given to the winner 
of the case and he, greeting chief and elders, leaves amid 
great noise, cheering, and rejoicing. The losers greet 
the king and court respectfully and go quietly back to their 
village. 



CHAPTER V 



Peace & War 

A PEACEFUL country is an old country, or as 
it is called in local parlance, " the country of 
the old fowl," i.e. a country where the fowls are 
not swooped down upon and carried off by raiding parties. 
One of the most welcome sounds that greet the ear of the 
traveller on emerging from the forest and approaching 
human habitations is the voice of chanticleer, often long 
before one sights the smoke of the village, or hears the merry 
voices of children playing on the outskirts of the forest, 
or on the approaches leading to a group of beehive-shaped 
huts. In the days when fire and sword swept through the 
land from end to end, villages were burned to the ground, 
and there are few countries from east to west that one has 
not seen in the throes of war. Villages were being con- 
tinually rebuilt, and newly built villages were the miserable 
symbol of countries recently devastated by war. Culti- 
vation and abundance of food was another evidence of a 
peaceful country, and for five miles and often more, 
from the centre of a group of hamlets, one would come 
on smiling stretches of cultivation : fields of golden- 
tasselled maize, or wavy millet, olive-green gardens of 
cassava, patches of potato vines, beans, and deeply dug 
beds of the much-coveted monkey-nut. I have bought fat 
chickens at ten for two yards of calico, worth tenpence ; 
goats and fat-tailed sheep for the equivalent of half a crown. 
In times of war these would be wiped out, and a fresh start 
had to be made by securing new stock, and many a village 

57 



58 Peace War 

I have helped, and given a fresh start to in this respect. 
The natives appreciate help of this kind, and by and by they 
return the compliment in the form of a good present in kind. 

The hoe versus the gun signifies peace versus war. 
There were many tribes that lived entirely by the gun ] 
and made subject tribes supply their food. This was the 
real African regime of militarism such as was found among 
the soldier tribes of Zulu, Hausa, and Masai origin, with 
many others now defunct. In the cultivation of their 
own country the work was done for them by slave labour 
and by subject peoples on whom they preyed, and they 
themselves merely superintended the operations. Much 
of the grain grown was used for brewing beer, which the 
warrior tribes consumed in enormous quantities. Often 
drinking continued for months at a time, until all the grain 
was used up with the exception of a little left for seed 
purposes. One of the most common arts of war employed 
to reduce their enemies to subjection was to burn all their 
grain bins, and destroy the fields of food, and by this means 
compel them to sue for peace at any price. Sometimes this 
proved a shortsighted policy of killing the goose that laid 
the egg, and produced famine that reacted and punished 
even the conquerors. 

Casus belli are innumerable ; often real, sometimes 
imaginary, but more often the repetition of iEsop's old 
tale of " The wolf and the lamb." (Of course, iEsop was 
an African !) The casus belli of the Sanga war that ended 
in the break-up of Msidi's kingdom, was the shooting of 
Masenga, a Sanga woman. In the Lunda country I have 
seen war declared on a district because a man infringed 
the law of forest rights, and dug honey out of a tree growing 
in the country of another chief. I remember war being 
declared by old Mieri Mieri, a notorious brigand chief, 
near Fort Rosebery (before Government days) because 



Peace & War 59 

Chinama, a local chief, picked up an elephant that had 
been shot in the former's territory. I met him on the 
warpath in paint and feathers, and succeeded in persuading 
him to settle the matter amicably. 

Nkole law used to be one of the fertile causes of inter- 
tribal war. Somebody caught somebody, who was a far-off 
relative of somebody who knew somebody who robbed 
or shot a man, whose relatives put the matter before the 
chief, who constituted this interference a casus belli , and 
declared war. Any infringement, however trivial, of 
hunting or fishing rights was considered poaching, and 
poaching laws were severe, often ending in war and heavy 
fines in slices of territory and slaves. A hunter shooting 
an elephant or other head of big game which may die in a 
neighbouring country, has, in the case of an elephant, to 
give up a tusk and the choice pieces of meat, or if other big 
game, a hind leg with the breast, liver, heart, and kidneys. 
Failure to do so would involve his chief and people in 
immediate war. When all was said and done the only real 
and basic law in Bantuland prior to the advent of European 
government was the law of Might. The Arabs never tired 
of saying " The gun is king of Africa," and it proved in 
every instance the last argument of African chiefs. Even 
in personal quarrels this applied, e.g. if a man entered 
another's field he was speared or shot ; if he entered 
another's house to steal his goods or his wife, he was 
summarily dealt with — " treat him as you would a hyena " 
Was the law, i.e. shoot or spear him. 

The laws of ultimatum differed in various countries, and 
depended largely on the arms used by the tribe in question. 
Though the symbol of war varied, the symbol of peace was, 
in every instance, the same, viz. a hoe. Among very 
primitive peoples the symbol of war was usually an arrow 
or a spear. Among tribes who had been in touch with the 



6o 



Peace &* War 



coast and traders the war symbol was a cartridge of gun- 
powder wrapped up in paper, with a bullet or two inserted 
at the end. Sometimes a knife or any sharp steel instrument 
was sufficient to suggest war, and used as a war symbol in 
issuing an ultimatum. Chela or Chuma are words used 
for metal, and used synonymously for weapons of war. 
It is also used as we use it in English, metaphorically, thus : 
" I shall show you my metal " ; "a man of metal," etc. 

If, again, a chief was well supplied with guns and gun- 
powder, he might, out of pure swagger (filumba) send a 
loaded gun as an ultimatum. In every instance the hoe 
had to accompany the weapon. Whatever the choice of 
ultimatum symbols, hoe and bullet, hoe and gun, the choice 
of either decided the issue. If, as rarely happened, a war 
of extermination was decided on, no choice of hoe accom- 
panied the message or messenger. An enemy, or enemies, 
would be caught in the woods, the heads cut off and 
sprinkled with gunpowder, and these would be laid on the 
road, or cross-roads, leading to the enemy's country. 
This was done by the Wemba and Arabs in N.E. Rhodesia 
to defy the government of Nyasaland when they made 
their first attempt to take over the country thirty years ago. 

When war was decided upon after appeal to the local 
deity, or fetish, a declaration of war usually took the visible 
form of small pieces of ant-heap into which were stuck a 
few red feathers of the war-bird (Nduba) and these were 
laid at the various approaches to the enemy's country. 
Wars of defence were often undertaken with vigour and 
every possible preparation hastened to give the oncoming 
enemy a warm reception. I was once camped in a large 
village (Chivas) on the Luapula River, when messengers 
arrived from Kazembe with a declaration of war, and 
within five minutes the whole village was like a beehive. 
Blacksmiths got out their old dusty goatskin bellows, tongs, 



Peace & War 



61 



and hammers. They rushed here and there for charcoal, 
and in a very little time the smithy was full of horny-handed 
blacksmiths and their helpers. Men rushed up with their 
spears and arrows, and axes, and old flintlocks to be repaired, 
and soon the sparks were flying, and the stone anvil sounding 
with heavy blows of sledge and small hammers. Old guns 
were hastily repaired and cleaned up, spear-heads were 
sharpened, or forged, with arrows lying in little heaps, 
while every conceivable kind of metal weapon was put into 
shape, handled, and burnished for war. Others rushed 
to the forest with their axes and cut and carried in stout 
poles to strengthen and repair the stockade, while another 
lot dug a deep moat round the village and cleared away all 
long grass and bush. Women set to work to pound and 
grind meal and prepare food to withstand a possible siege, 
while boys and girls ran round everywhere, helping in any 
and every way they could Before many hours had passed 
the palisade was strengthened, a clearing made all round 
the village to avoid the unseen approach of a lurking enemy, 
and men had donned war-paint and feathers and were 
performing a wild war dance to show their readiness 
to give a good account of themselves. 

Wars of offence and aggrandisement were conducted more 
slowly, and with greater care and deliberation. In the 
case of Msidi he used to send and consult the great Ju-jus — 
Makumba and Ngosa — on the eastern side of the Luapula 
River. To obtain an audience of the oracle he had to send 
presents of cowrie shells and slaves before enquiries could 
be made as to whether he would be successful, or otherwise, 
if he made war in such and such a direction. In every 
instance the god's advice would be followed out in every 
detail. The Wemba tribe consulted their famous war 
fetish called Lilamfia. This was kept by members of a 
guild called the Bachamanga welamfia, and was compounded 



62 



Peace War 



of, among other things of potent medicinal value, a small 
piece of the skull of a famous Lungu warrior chief called 
Chikoko. To make this, a slave's throat was cut and the 
blood used on the fetish, which was made to spin round 
and round, and where it pointed when it stopped spinning 
was an indication as to the direction in which they should 
go and make successful war. Most of the Wemba warfare 
was of an offensive nature, and only on a few occasions were 
they forced to take the defensive, and those were when 
attacked by the Angoni- Zulus. Their wars were as a rule 
of a very brutal nature, and associated with much cruelty 
and mutilations, many of which would hardly bear descrip- 
tion. Like Msidi of the Katanga, their name was a terror 
in all the surrounding countries and among every tribe save 
the Angoni-Zulu. 

Internal wars were more the rule than the exception 
throughout the Luba country in the Congo. I have been 
visited in my camp by messengers with tusks of ivory 
oifered in payment for help to kill a brother, or a cousin, 
and replace him by an ambitious relative. The messengers 
were greatly surprised that I should refuse such a tempting 
offer. Said they : " Just let them see you've got men and 
guns and can shoot and we'll win our cause without a blow." 
These internal struggles are very sanguinary and protracted, 
and due in most cases to some covetous cousin who is deter- 
mined to oust the other out of the chieftainship. He first 
secures a following by means of bribes and promises, and 
then sets to work to undermine the other's influence 
surreptitiously. By and by, when he feels sure of success, 
he strikes the open blow and declares war. I know of two 
brothers who quarrelled and after a fight agreed to separate 
and divide the country in two. These have since become 
two rival clans with different names, and live peaceably 
side by side in Rhodesia. 



Peace War 



63 



Just as the law of symbolism is seen in sending a hoe and 
a bullet to an enemy, so one chief will send his spear 
(which is equivalent to his sceptre) to another, to request 
his help in fighting an enemy. As remarked elsewhere, in 
travelling one's help has been sought again and again 
by chiefs at war, and ivory and slaves offered as payment. 
I have known traders who have enriched themselves by 
such mercenary methods, and on the occasion referred to 
in Angoniland {vide Chap. XXVI) the war was said to be 
due to a white man who supplied the guns and powder and 
helped the natives against each other. As these men usually 
act in countries outside European spheres of influence, it 
is very difficult to reach them with the law, however long 
its arm. 

Guerilla warfare used to be much indulged in throughout 
the Katanga by the Aborigines. They would lie in wait 
along the road and kill and capture their enemies. Some- 
times they would make surprise attacks during the night, 
and shoot fire arrows into the thatch of their enemies' 
huts in the dark, and when the occupants were clearing 
out they would shoot or spear them, catching at the same 
time many prisoners. Sometimes, like my erstwhile friend 
Mulowanyama, they would take to the hills or the caves 
of Sangaland, whence they would emerge for periodic 
raids and forays on their more powerful but less secure 
neighbours. For years the West Coast caravan road was 
endangered by bands of Mulowanyama' s bandits. On one 
occasion they plotted the life of my colleague, but for- 
tunately he was detained in Angola and the plot miscarried, 
though his messenger was caught and killed at the Lualaba 
River. Once I fell into one of their traps near the Lualaba 
River, close to where the messenger was killed. Leaving 
camp one morning with my carriers, I ran full tilt into a 
trap. A band of these strapping hillmen sent by the rebel 



6 4 



Peace &* War 



chief blocked my road. I sauntered boldly up to them 
as they lined up along my path, barring my way with gun 
in hand, and pans primed for work. I took the bull by the 
horns and greeted them in the most friendly fashion, 
presuming on their chief's once expressed friendship. 
I talked, and talked, and argued, and presumed they were 
out after elephants, and held out my hand to wish them 
well. They looked at their guns and at each other, then 
at me and my men. Meanwhile, I was talking away 
thirteen to the dozen, and eventually wishing them 
" Good day " I ordered my men forward. I sidled off, 
with my hand waving " Good-bye " or " Go you well," 
but with my left eye turned well back and my rifle and 
cartridge belt handy, my chief desire being to avoid any 
shot from behind. Their sulky, hang-dog expression, 
and their shuffling manner, considering that they were 
armed to the teeth, convinced me, with what I afterwards 
found to have been good reason, that they had orders to 
bring my head to the cave. 

Later on the same chief with his gang was driven by a 
powerful Congo State force into his cave where, with all 
his people save three, he miserably perished. This action, 
however, cost the State the life of Lieutenant Froment, a 
brave Belgian official, who was killed by a shot from an 
elephant gun at the first charge. 

Bantu negroes on the battlefield are not the formidable 
and bloodthirsty foes one would expect to find. I have 
been the eyewitness of a lot of native skirmishing in the 
bush and in the open, and it is certainly not the bloody 
affair one had been led to anticipate. Very often the side 
that draws first blood is considered the victor and the 
other side retires. Lots of their shooting is mere noise and 
wild display. I have watched a fight on two consecutive 
days when guns banged on every hand and men were shot 
at all around me, but the net result in casualties was nil. 



Greeting a Village Headman in Kazembe's District. 
Head-dress of Women and Children, Chokwe Tribe, Angola. 



Peace <§f War 



65 



Of course this does not apply to trained fighting tribes like 
the Yeke, Wemba, or Zulu. The Arabs, too, and their 
bands of Rugaruga mercenaries, are a bloody lot who slay 
and spare not, whose object was, as a rule, ivory, slaves, 
and loot. The Swahili are, many of them, good shots, and 
I know one who in war shot an old friend of mine from a 
bastion at three hundred yards. He is to-day chief of a 
big village in North- Western Rhodesia. 

Hostages are often respected and treated well, at any rate 
so long as the object for which they are held is also re- 
spected, and people usually maintain good behaviour so 
long as they know that their hostages are treated well. 
When the object is attained the hostages are returned to 
their people laden with presents and messages of good-will. 
Prisoners of war receive scant mercy, and are as a rule 
treated cruelly. Frequently, on return from war, some of 
these are sacrificed at the graves of the dead chiefs. Others 
may be sacrificed at the triumph of the victorious general 
and army. Those who remain are kept as slaves, given to 
the soldiers, and may be sold at any moment to a passing 
caravan. I have seen great gangs of prisoners of war, men, 
women, and children, all of whom were treated brutally, 
and were emaciated owing to the length of their journey 
from the scene of war, and the heavy loads they were com- 
pelled to carry. Among cannibal tribes many of these 
were killed and eaten by the way. A real war dance is, 
once seen, not readily effaced from the tablet of memory, 
and is a sight the details of which haunt one the remainder 
of a lifetime. I remember one at which quite three thou- 
sand people were present. The chief had gone with an 
army to punish an old enemy who was hand in glove with a 
rebel chief. The village was surrounded and attacked and 
the males killed, the women and children were captured 
together with twenty-two good-sized tusks of ivory. On 
his return the chief waited a few days outside his capital 

E 



66 



Peace &* War 



while preparations were duly made for trie day of triumphal 
entry. The people, gaudily dressed and painted up for 
the occasion, gave the warriors a roaring welcome, and then 
gathered in an open space in the middle of the town which 
had been prepared for the big war-dance (tomboka). I 
went along and watched, as I thought it might possibly 
prevent any undue cruelties. Five great war-drums, ranging 
in size, boomed out victory and defiance, besides marimba, 
telephone drums, and drums and musical instruments of 
other kinds, all in charge of the big bandmaster. The 
band struck up, and amid the thunder of the war drums 
and the acclamations of the people the chief took his seat 
on the lion skin. Each warrior danced into the middle, the 
head or heads of those he killed dangling from his mouth. 
He pranced about, firing his matchlock, and, tired and 
sweating, placed his heads at the feet of his chief, who 
promptly put his foot on each. As each warrior danced he 
deposited his heads till the pile grew into a great grim 
heap. When all the warriors had finished these gruesome 
proceedings, Queen Mahanga sent every one wild with her 
renowned dancing — which recalled the Salome scene. 
Women ran in front of her dropping green leaves in her 
path as she danced. Then, when she had finished, the chief 
wobbled forward in State dress like a great sausage, sword 
in hand, and despite his cumbersome robes brought the 
dance to an end dancing himself, amid thunders of applause 
and songs and orations of praise to the chief and his 
warriors. I came away sick at heart from the devilish 
sight, glad to be back at my house three miles south from 
the capital. The consequences of defeat are seen in the 
grovelling servility on the part of the conquered and a 
readiness to suffer any insult or ignominy. They pay up 
with alacrity all war taxes imposed, whether in slaves or 
service of any kind. " We do it to save our necks " is the 
reply given. 



CHAPTER VI 



Cruel Customs 

NATIVE slave traders are past-masters in the art of 
torturing slaves. The torture may take the form 
of the slow excision of an external organ, or the 
cutting out of pieces of live flesh, refined sarcasm (to which 
I have often heard a native express his preference for the 
hippo whip), flogging with the shambok often till death, 
twisting back the thumbs or fingers until they touch the 
forearm, pulling out hair and eyelashes, burning with hot 
irons, and other excruciating tortures. I have seen them 
cut V-shaped notches — like saw-teeth — in the edges of two 
pieces of split bamboo, then place these up the side of the 
head and tighten them by means of a rope under the chin 
and over the head, screwing the rope until the V-edge of 
the bamboo cut into the temples and almost drove the man 
mad. I have rushed in to save a young slave while the 
master, after flogging him with a scourge of thorns, held 
the axe over his head threatening his life. 

Prisoners taken in war were also tortured in all manner 
of ways, many being done to death on the return journey. 
One official is called Teta matwi, which means " the ear 
slitter " ; another is called ^ eta miongo, " the vertebrae 
cutter," who uses an axe for this purpose ; another is 
called Yamagazi, the " bloody man," who uses spear and 
axe to cut and hack. 

Sometimes they are poked at, spat at, and buffeted before 
being subjected to other forms of punishment. Many 

67 



68 



Cruel Customs 



have their throats slit and die slowly for sacrificial purposes, 
or for " blood paint " to smear fetishes or war drums — 
while some are speared or shot off-hand. On the other hand, 
some prisoners are kept to be put to death at the chief's 
triumph when he returns officially to his people after a 
successful war. Even children taken in war and slave 
children are killed off-hand. At a nasty fight not far from 
where I lived many children were done to death, some 
speared, others had their brains dashed out against trees 
or stones. The native idea of war is extermination, and 
they laugh at white men shooting a man and then carrying 
him off on a stretcher to a hospital to be nursed and cared 
for. 

Native Courts of Appeal. — (i) The Poison Cup. — Natives 
have queer ideas of justice from our point of view, and 
very curious tests in order to prove innocence or guilt. 
One of these is the poison cup. The witch doctor prepares 
gourds full of a powerful poison procured in the forest and 
called Mzvafi, and each of the accused must drink it. If 
the accused drinks and vomits the poison, he is acquitted 
as innocent. If he dies his guilt is considered proven by 
the fact of his death. Although there may be faking of 
the cup for different persons, and undoubtedly there is, 
the fact remains that some do vomit the poison and are 
exonerated. 

(2) The boiling pot ordeal for witchcraft is one that 
spares few save the old horny-handed and tough-skinned. 
In this trial a fire is lighted on an ant-heap at the cross- 
roads, and a long deep pot of water is brought and placed 
on the fire until the water is boiling. Meanwhile the chief 
and all the people gather to witness the trial. Those 
accused, or those who, to prove their innocence, have 
appealed to the " test," draw near to the pot of boiling 
water, and the witch doctor, dressed and painted up, sings 



Cruel Customs 



6 9 



and dances and jumps around, and then dramatically drops 
a small pebble into the deep pot of boiling water. Each 
of the accused has to plunge the hand in slowly and take 
out the pebble three times ; after the third time his arm is 
examined, and if the skin is not burnt or damaged in any 
way he or she is acquitted ; but if it is in any way burnt 
or damaged they are considered guilty, condemned, marked 
with the red chalk, and burned to death. And so with all 
the accused on trial. Sometimes old people with hardened 
skins come out unscathed, and this is held up before Euro- 
peans as a justification of the boiling-pot ordeal. Some- 
times several are thus tried, condemned, and sentenced to 
death. When they are thus proved guilty and marked 
with the red chalk (the condemnation mark, as the white 
chalk is the justification mark) they are hurried away tied 
up in ropes, amid the jeers and insults of the crowd, who 
call them all sorts of vile names, spit at them, etc. Fire- 
wood is then collected by the public in enormous quantities, 
the fire is lighted, and the doctor ties the victims to trees 
round the fire, their faces looking towards the fire. Then 
the mob perform the death dance around them, chanting 
weird and gruesome songs, led by the witch doctor, such 
as : 

" The doctor dons the red paint, 
To-day he's feeding on flesh. 
The lions that hid in the grass patch, 
To-day we've burned to death." 

Then the doctor approaches his victims one by one and 
hacks off an arm which he throws on the fire. He then cuts 
off another and throws it on the burning pile, the victim 
looking on and slowly bleeding to death. He next hacks 
off a leg, then the other leg, then the head and neck, after 
which the trunk is finally thrown on. This he does with 
all the victims, meanwhile becoming gory with the blood 



70 Cruel Customs 

of the executed. Those present then circle round the fire, 
singing wild, blood-curdling songs, and often in their mad 
frenzy cutting each other. When the bodies have been 
consumed and the fires have burned down, the people 
scatter to their villages in groups as from war. On one 
occasion a missionary doctor and myself attempted to 
save two old women who were tried for witchcraft by the 
above ordeal, but arrived too late. The fires were still 
burning though the people had fled, but the smell of burning 
flesh and the sight of half-burned parts of human bodies 
were revolting, and we were glad to leave the scene. This 
happened a mile or so from the station where the mis- 
sionaries lived. 

Trial by Pepper. — In the West Luba country they have 
a trial by pepper pipe which the accused person to prove 
his innocence is given to smoke. The pipe is of the usual 
hubble-bubble type and is filled with tobacco, mixed with 
red peppers, and other saliva-producing items. He has to 
smoke an enormous pipeful of this peppery mixture without 
once spitting, and if he spits he is considered guilty and 
condemned to death. 

In another part an accused person has to swim through 
a crocodile-infested pool and if he comes out safe it is a 
proof of his innocence, and that he is therefore under the 
special protection of the gods who thus justify him publicly. 

Burying alive used to be practised at the interment of 
big chiefs and even small headmen on the plea that they 
must not be permitted to go to the other world unaccom- 
panied. Chiefs, including Msidi, used to bury men in the 
ground up to the neck, and dig them out after three days. 
Kafwimbi, a Luapula chief, and other chiefs, cut off 
women's breasts for adultery (vide Chapter IV). I have 
heard a native headman (an old friend of mine) tell how 
Msidi sent him with others to the Luba country to bring 



Cruel Customs 71 

Back so many human skins. They would attack a village, 
kill men and flay them, dry the skins in the sun, tie them 
in a bundle and bring them back to their chief. Some 
were used for mats, and others were sewn and inflated, 
and made to stand in the presence of the old ogre. 

The Wemba chiefs regularly practised as a punishment 
gouging or pulling out eyes with fish-hooks, cropping ears, 
nose, and lips, lopping off hands and toes, and even de- 
sexing men for immorality. The Wemba are noted for the 
variety of their mutilation punishments. 

Penalty for stealing, loss of fingers. 

Attempted murder, loss of both hands. 

Adultery, amongst other mutilations, the loss of both eyes. 

Lying to a chief, loss of lips. • 

Betrayal of chief, loss of ears, hand, and foot. 
(The last-mentioned crime is a characteristic of Wemba 
natives, and their name means " the betrayers of their 
chiefs," and is heard thus : "Awe mukwai, Ababemba bale- 
bemba mfumu shyabo," adding, " E Babemba mukwai ! ") 

Sometimes they would tie a man hand and feet and lay 
him at an ant's hole to be picked to death. Again, they 
would cut off the eyelids of a man and tie him to a raised 
frame, face upwards, to expose the lidless eyeballs to the 
sun. These mutilation punishments were multiplied by 
every possible device, so that to enumerate all forms of 
torture and mutilation would be an utter impossibility. 
As a rule these punishments were only inflicted on criminals 
as a deterrent against crime, but, sometimes, though not 
often, vindictiveness or revenge would prompt such 
cruelty. These mutilated people, many of whom I have 
seen and know personally, were a walking, living advertise- 
ment to the power of the king and country's laws, and were 
meant, most often, to teach that these could not be 
infringed with impunity. 



72 Cruel Customs 

Often if a big chief discovered a man with the special 
gift of music, to prevent his ever playing and singing before 
any other chief he would gouge out his eyes, otherwise 
mutilate him, and keep him as a court minstrel, for being 
thus blinded he could not wander far away. 

Monstrosities were usually put to death at birth, though 
cretins, hunchbacks, and otherwise deformed people were 
permitted to live, and sometimes got the post of court or 
village jester. 

Infanticide is one of the most wicked and inhuman of 
the African cruel customs. This consists in the putting to 
death of a baby that cuts the upper incisor teeth before the 
lower. The cutting of the lower incisors is a great event, 
and is considered the child's " life justification." A child 
which cuts its teeth abnormally is a cbinkula, " unlucky 
child," and if permitted to live would bring ill-luck on its 
people and village. A woman who gives birth to a nice 
healthy baby watches most carefully, as she nurses it, for 
the first sign of teeth, for the appearance of teeth is the 
great event in Bantu babyland. Should she wake up one 
morning to find that her child has cut an upper tooth 
before a lower, she may hide it for a few days, but soon 
another upper shows and the mother is heart-broken, for 
her baby is doomed. She may still try to hide it, but this 
is nearly impossible, and any attempt to do so rarely 
succeeds. One day with tears in her eyes she calls her 
mother and tells her of her misfortune. The mother 
condoles with her and tells her not to cry ; she tells the 
elder women and midwives, who console her thus : " Look 
here, this child is unlucky ; it is unfortunate that it has 
come into the world, but if it were allowed to live endless 
harm would result to you and us, so it must die. This is 
the law of the land. Don't cry, for if you do you will 
never have another child. Dry your tears and be a brave 



Cruel Customs 73 



woman." They then form a little procession and go down 
to the river with the baby. When they reach the river- 
side, after again condoling with the mother, they hold up 
the baby and address it, saying : " Poor little baby, you 
are a chinkula, an unlucky child ; it's a pity you came, but 
you must go home, much as we should like to keep you. 
Good-bye, little one, go away." After which they throw 
it gently into the river where it is soon picked up by a 
crocodile. They turn again towards the house consoling 
the mother, and return to the village in procession as they 
came. When they reach the house they shave the mother's 
head, wash and anoint her, and give her further advice 
about crying and fretting, emphasising the fact that she 
will have no more children if she cries ; and then they 
leave her, going to their houses. The idea is that if such a 
child were allowed to live it would turn into a wild beast 
and prey on the villagers who had failed to smell it out 
and decree its death. 

Koloso executions used to be periodical, when on a fixed 
day there would be the wholesale burning to death of 
witches and other criminals who, though sentenced to death, 
had been kept waiting till others had been brought in from 
different parts of the country. This was one of the common 
forms of punishment for adultery with kings' or headmen's 
wives. A big koloso or corral of strong logs was built, say, 
twenty feet square and twelve feet high. Inside this 
strong stakes were driven into the ground, to which the 
guilty pairs were tied, back to back. The whole country 
gathered and took part in the execution. Firewood was 
cut and brought and thrown over the walls of the koloso 
until the prisoners were covered and the heap piled high 
above them. Then, when all was ready, the doctor set a 
light to it, and began the death-dance round the burning 
pyre, in which dance and weird accompanying songs the 



% 

74- Cruel Customs 

great crowds of people joined. Sometimes before the 
firewood was brought a young man would manage to free 
himself and leap over the wall and escape to the country of a 
neighbouring chief, who, if sufficiently powerful, would 
refuse to hand him over. Though this happened occasion- 
ally by the help of friends, it really happened very rarely, 
the risk was too great. 



CHAPTER VII 



The Man from Below 

GANGA, or witch doctor, means the " clever 
man," the " light-fingered man," the " man 
who wriggles," but when any one is sick or in 
trouble and the doctor's services are required, his official 
title of Nganga is not the one commonly used but the homely, 
eminently descriptive one, thus : " Call ye in the Man from 
Below " (Kuieni yamasambd). 

There are various kinds of doctors, with twelve of which 
I am personally acquainted, and there are higher and lower 
grades in the profession, but the chief significance of the 
African fetish doctor is seen in the above name which 
indicates the leading characteristic of his professional 
duties. He is a man of the underworld and has to do with 
the dead, and " dead man's land," from whence come all 
trouble and disease. The peculiar hang-dog expression of 
the man, his fierce and implacable resentment of outside 
interference, his proud, ominous bearing as he swaggers 
round from village to village with his satellites, all emphasise 
the fact that he lives in a real underworld of wonder 
and mystery, the keys of which nether kingdom jingle 
in his fetish basket in the form of human skulls, bones, 
hair, finger and toe nails of dead witches and wizards, 
with every conceivable kind of potent charm. As a qualified 
practitioner he claims to be, and is, called " the father of 
fetishcraft," and the initiate he agrees to take along with 

75 




76 The Man from Below 



him, and teach the secret of smelling out witches, and 
making charms, poisons, and medicines, and who has to 
undergo a term of one full year's instruction, and initiation, 
plus many very severe tests, is called " the son of fetish- 
craft." A fetish doctor in full dress and at work divining, 
or witch-finding, or carrying out an execution, is the most 
grotesquely hideous creature imaginable. With great 
red feather head-dress flapping like some hideous night- 
bird, painted, bedecked with leopard skins and endless 
charms rattling round his body, eyelids whitened and 
grinning like an ogre as he performs the wild death dance, 
or with hoarse voice calls up the spirits, he is a sight which 
once seen haunts one always. The sinuous movements 
of the body as he wriggles, the clutching at the air with his 
bony fingers as they twist and turn in simulating demon 
possession, indicate if not an artful, clever rogue and 
deceiver, certainly a very clever man who personates and 
is the real recognised ruler of the destinies of Bantuland, 
and whose name of Yamasamba, or Nganga, is no haphazard 
one. To learn the business of fetishcraft, the initiate 
accompanies the doctor in all his duties, and on all his 
journeys, carrying his fetish basket and doctor's dress. 
He arranges the suitable spot for operations, lays out in due 
order the fetishes and things required for work, and stands 
by, sometimes shaking a rattle and answering questions, 
or joining in the doctor's divination questions, songs, and 
ceremonies, with the interest of his master always in view. 
Thus he learns the practical and objective part of the 
business. The doctor also takes him out to the forest and 
shows him the various roots, barks, and herbs, and instructs 
him when to collect them, and how to concoct and com- 
pound them, and explains to him their several uses and 
abuses. 

The following accounts of the initiation rites of a young 



The Man from Below 77 



doctor and of divination ceremonies were written for me by 
an ex-witch doctor : — 

A man, in order to receive initation into the business of 
fetish doctor, goes to the " father of fetishcraft " and says, 
" I want to be a doctor." If the doctor agrees, he says, 
V All right, let's go outside the village." They go and, 
choosing a suitable spot, they hoe up a little mound. 
They place a clay pot on the top of it with some aromatic 
plants inside. They then pour water into it, and when 
all is mixed the initiate kneels down on the ground and 
drinks. Others beat with their village pestles on the ground 
as they go round and round the initiate, who thereupon 
becomes demon-possessed, and ventriloquises. He strikes 
up a little song, singing : 



A child who asked for a crown, 
Found it among the departed spirits. 
Here there must be no crying and tears, 
Nothing but music and song." 



They lead him into the village, where he takes to himself 
a new name, saying : " I'm the spirit world, whence the 
noises come." Then he listens as though he is listening 
to the sound of footsteps, and immediately becomes 
demon-possessed again. They then seize him, warn him 
not to speak, and put a green leaf on his head. The 
following morning they feed him with " hell food " 
(a medicine food) in which the eye of a cock fowl is mixed 
and make him swallow this. They stand him on a rock, 
after which the head fetish doctor takes him away to 
the " devil's mound," where he gains his first experience 
of the " hell medicine." This is composed of ashes of 
burnt witches, etc., and is the medicine which enables 
him to obtain intercourse with the demons and departed 
spirits, and by which he divines and smells out witches and 
wizards. Being given the bwanga bwa kalunga, or " hell 



yS The Man from Below 



medicine," is equivalent to a diploma, so that though he 
has much to learn still, he is in a position to practise and 
may take fees. 

Initiation of a Nganga ya bzvilande, or Spear Doctor 
{Nganga ya mukove in the Kaonde and N. Luba country). 
The doctors and people gather and dance and sing while 
the initiate is placed on a mat in the middle of the chief's 
compound, and all sing the following song to the music 
of the drums :— 

" My grown-up daughter 

Has gone to the water. 

On returning to us 

She's a mother of many." 

(referring to the Cbisungu, grown up, or puberty ceremony). 
As they dance the head doctor springs forward with his 
spear in his hand, and after making some flourishes, spears 
the initiate through the chest and kills him (he is supposed 
to die). The blood is taken as it flows from the spear 
wound, put into a basin and carried to the hut outside the 
village to which also the novice's (supposed) dead body 
is carried. (In this connection read Rider Haggard's 
story of the Zulu witch, Dr. Indaba nzimbi, who similarly 
kills Macumazahn in the story of Allen's Wife). Only 
doctors may go there, where the novice is washed with fetish 
decoctions and made to drink his own blood mixed with 
other medicines, after which he is trampled on and brought 
back to life. He is then marked with chalks in many coloured 
stripes and spots, whitened round the eyes, and decked 
out in his new doctor's dress, equivalent to cap and gown, 
and decorated with a set of fetishes to be used in his future 
work. After this he is led back to the village by the head 
doctors, and on reaching the drums he springs up and 
dances his first doctor's dance in full dress. He then takes 
a new name, saying, " I'm Kashingu" i.e. " the spinning 
top," or some other name considered suitable. He takes 



The Man from Below 79 



his place again on the mat in the middle of the dancing 
circle, and the people shout and throw him presents of 
beads, etc. The head doctors then give him his first basket 
of fetishes with which he has to begin work, learning their 
uses by accompanying the doctors for a year, during which 
he may also practise on his own and take fees. 

His first {dead) witch case. It happens that a son has a 
mother who warns him, scolding him, and saying : " Listen to 
what I say, my boy, and do your duty." The son disrespect- 
fully says to the father, " You shall marry again," at which 
the mother conceives a grievance at her heart, and after a 
few days she dies. They bury her in the usual way and 
return to the village. At the end of a year one of the sons 
the mother scolded falls sick. They call in a doctor, who 
divines, and who tells them : " It's the mother you insulted 
who has caused the sickness, and death will follow." He 
dies, they mourn for him, and resume normal life. A 
few days after the remaining child sickens. They call a 
doctor, who divines, saying : " You insulted your mother, 
too, and it is she who is killing off the children in this 
house ; neither shall you recover." He also dies. Then 
they go for the doctor, taking initial fees, and say to him : 
f We have called you, doctor, to dig up for us the dead, 
disquieted spirit, which is eating us up." In the morning 
the doctor and his assistants come with their fetishes and 
the " hell fetish." On arriving at the house he who carries 
the divination basket stands till they give him a fee, then 
he places it on the ground. They make a circle, including 
the man who has lost the two children and who has asked 
for the divination. Then the doctor strikes up a little 
divination song : 

" I am calling, calling, dig me up (dead witch). 
I'm the doctor, that's my business (doctor). 
I'm the demon, homeless, clanless (demon witch). 
I'm the doctor, prosecutor (doctor)." 



80 The Man from Below 



Next morning they go to where the witch was buried, 
with guides to lead the way. On arrival the guides point 
out the place, saying : " She was laid there." The relatives 
retire, and the doctor strikes up a witch song : 

" O owl that cries in the thicket. Fwi ! Fwi ! 
Oh, come and take away my sorrow. 
O demon, to-day I'll take you away, away. 
Come up, come out, I command you." 

They sing louder and louder, and dig away with their hoes. 
As they get down they find some bones, when they strike 
up a little song : 

" I see a little cute one ; 
Yes, I see a little cute one." (Repeated.) 

They collect firewood and light a fire, and gathering up the 
bones they throw them on, especially the skull and leg 
bones. The doctor pierces the skull with an axe and 
breathes into the opening. When all is burnt up the doctor 
smears red paint on his body and sings : 

" She's showing her teeth in the skull. 
You weren't burnt in the hole. 
Now you're burnt in the hole, 
You who showed your teeth in the skull." 

Having finished burning the bones they take away the charred 
skull and an old bone, which they carry to the village. While 
returning home they must not look back. On reaching 
the village they are welcomed with cheers. Those who went 
with the doctor may not speak of what they saw and did 
while they were away, for such would be criminal. On 
their return they go to the house of the doctor's slave 
who carried the fetish basket, and sleep there. In the 
morning fetishes are made from the charred bones and 
given to the relatives of the deceased as a protection 
against evil spells. Then the doctor tells them all : " The 



From " Dead Man's Land." 

A man disguised as a spirit returned from the land of the Dead. 



The Man from Below 81 



demon witch who was killing off your children, I've got 
her in my basket. She's gone with the witch doctor. 
I'm the black stork." He then receives his final fees and 
departs, dancing as he goes, and singing the following 
ditty : 

" Where the doctor has gone, 
All sickness has flown." 

Twelve kinds of doctors who 'practise. 
(There are besides these many other kinds.) 

(1) Nganga ya mawesa. Doctor of the boiling pot ordeal. 

(2) Nganga ya chilumbu. Diviner about sickness and 
trouble. 

(3) Nganga ya chishimba. Witch doctor who uses crystal 
gazing (ngulu). 

(4) Nganga ya kapale. Seed-gourd-rattling doctor and 
diviner. 

(5) Nganga ya Mupini. Doctor who divines with axe 
on a skin. 

(6) Nganga ya kamimbi. Rain doctor, or the " swallow 
doctor." 

(7) Nganga ya chipungu. Pot and basket diviner. 

(8) Nganga ya musashi. Clairvoyant, who professes 
to see in a gourd of oil sickness and trouble, etc. 

(9) Nganga ya chikupo. Doctor who does not divine, 
but treats those who have already been diagnosed. He 
has cures for barrenness and serious ailments. 

(10) Nganga ya mukove. Smeller-out of witches and 
wizards. His initiation rite has been described. He is 
called the " spear doctor," and belongs to the Kaonde tribe. 

(11) Buana Mutombo. Tongues doctor. This is a doctor 
who is supposed to be able to give a man the power to 
speak — only during demon-possession — tongues he never 
knew before, which is only a temporary gift. 

(12) Nganga ya mwafi. Poison-cup doctor. 

F 



82 The Man from Below 



Divination, with prayers and promises to spirits in sickness. 
If a man becomes sick the people say : " Be sure and call 
in the doctor." Then they call the doctor, who drops into 
his incantations, saying : " Take him away, O wild fruit 
tree. (Of Mr. So-and-so, who does not need to be carried, 
you say, he is Mr. So-and-so, who should be carried, i.e. 
he's sick). They have broken up his internal organs. It is 
he who bears his name who has caused his sickness." (The 
one of whom he is the reincarnation). 

Spirit, speaking, prescribes remedy : " Let them dig me 
out a little boat. Build a spirit temple and put a spirit 
gourd inside with idols, and worship my spirit, and the 
sickness shall cease at once." Then the sick man says, 
addressing the spirit, after hearing the results of divina- 
tion, " O my guardian spirit, forgive me I pray you, I 
beseech you forgive my negligence. All that you ask for I 
will attend to, and do at once." When he recovers from 
illness he fulfils his promise to the spirit and builds a spirit 
hut to his namesake. All bans being removed now, he goes 
where he pleases, rubbing some white flour over his body 
for joy and gratitude, and is happy. 

Patients may call in a doctor to divine about anything. 
Recently while I was in the Luba country I sat by a doctor 
and watched him while he divined over three different 
people who called at his hut one evening. No. i had bought 
twelve ducks for breeding purposes, and a wild cat broke 
into the duck house one night and killed them. He wanted 
to know (a) Who caused the cat to attack his particular 
ducks, and why. (b) Whether, if he replaced these ducks 
by others, he would be successful in the future, and (c) 
whether it would be better to drop the matter altogether. 

No. 2 was a woman who had been sick and out of sorts 
for a long time and she wanted to know the cause of, and the 
cure for, her sickness. The divining oracle used was a small 



The Man from Below 83 



idol six inches long ; the thorax was carved out to allow 
of the doctor and his patient putting each a forefinger 
through it for the necessary rattling purposes, i.e. in gyrating 
it round the top of an inverted gourd. The idol wore a 
string of blue beads round the neck. As the doctor and 
patient gyrated the idol, at certain points the idol stopped 
hard and refused to be moved, which was a call from below. 
Then the doctor questioned the answering spirit, and 
continued interrogating until he got all the information 
required, and obtained the cure for his patient. 

No. 3 was a man, but as it was then midnight and I was 
sitting by showing rather much interest, the doctor refused 
to consult and rap further. I bought the oracle idol from 
him for three francs, and the doctor wanted to know 
whether I was going to use it for divining purposes among my 
European friends. When the doctor is called he usually 
gets a " starter," or initial fee, before he will go into a case. 
If the case is important, long, and involved, the fees are 
heavy, but may be paid in instalments stretching over a 
period of time. If not paid within a certain time the 
patient is claimed as a slave of the doctor (the word for 
debtor and slave is the same, mushya, and a debtor may 
be sold as a slave to pay his debts). 

Divination on receipt of news of war by a dream. Now 
it happens that when a chief has slept he dreams of war 
with a potential successor, and when he wakes out of sleep 
he says : " Listen, my people, and do not go out to the fields 
to-day because I have dreamed of war with my successor. 
War ! ah, War ! To-day their soldiers are sleeping near 
here." Then they send a scout to find out, saying, " Go 
and find where the war party is, and return quickly and 
tell us." He sets out, discovers where they are, and returns 
in haste, saying : " Yes, they have arrived and are in 
camp in the forest not far off." Then the chief goes into 



84 The Man from Below 



his house and brings out a clay pot with water in it, and he 
holds an Augury stone between his fingers. Then he 
questions it, saying : " If we shall be defeated please 
tell us, O our Augury." He then drops it into the water. 
If it so happens that the Augury stone does not sink to the 
bottom of the water pot, but floats, then they know they 
will not be defeated, but conquer. Then they go out and 
fight till sunset, when they return to their village and 
sleep. The chief who has attacked them dreams in sleep 
that he and his people have all been killed. When he 
awakes out of sleep he calls his people and tells them his 
dream, saying : " Come here to me and hear how I have 
slept." They gather and he tells them, saying : " Let's 
not continue the fighting to-day, for if we fight we shall 
all be killed. Let's run away," and they take to their heels 
and clear back home. Those inside the village, on waking 
up, shout : " Come on, let's out and fight." But there's 
no reply to their shouting. Then they know that their 
enemies have gone, they have run away. They shout 
with joy, saying : " They've run away," and going out to 
search and failing to find them return to their chief, 
and putting on the war-paint do a big war dance. 

Charms and composition of " hell fetish" Charms are 
made up of concoctions the ingredients of which are similar 
to those found in some parts of China. To enumerate 
the different kinds of charms, and the numerous things for 
which charms are used, would require a huge volume. 
Sometimes charms are put inside beetle shells, small buck 
horns, tortoise shells, tiny gourds or seed pods, lion and 
leopard claws, birds' bills, etc. Charms are preventive 
and used as safeguards and luck medicines against all the 
ills of life. The doctor's fetish basket (chife cha fisoko) 
contains the most weird and miscellaneous collection of 
charms, which are supposed to enable the doctor to meet 



The Man from Below 85 

every contingency that may arise. His dress and decorations 
form another queer miscellany, and he himself, dressed and 
painted up for work, resembles a sort of walking and dancing 
Christmas-tree — if you can imagine that — dangling with 
lions' claws, human skulls and bones, animal and snake 
skins hung with fetishes of all kinds, and varied fetish 
horns. 

Bwanga, bwa kalunga, or the great hell- fetish, by means 
of which he catches wizards and witches, is made out of a 
roan antelope horn, moulded round the top with more 
than a hundred fetish medicines which hold together by 
means of red clay and the sticky juice of the mulolo tree. 
The outside is decorated with human teeth like bead work, 
and in the centre is inserted a duiker horn. Some of the 
medicines used are a small piece of nearly every part of the 
human body, including hair, heart, finger and toe nails, 
mandible, skull, etc., heart and claws of the lion and 
leopard, elephant feet, hippo skin, tortoise-shell, swallow's 
bill, osprey's eye and vulture's eyebrow, head of a deadly 
snake, called ngzvesbi, which stands on its tail and springs 
to strike, heart of python, head of puff adder, sand from 
footprint of chief, nose of crocodile, fowl's beak, ant-bear 
claw, sand got from a pounded mountain stone, hair of 
dead chief, hyena's forehead, head of dogfish, tooth of 
field rat, scorpion, head of unlucky child, burned honey 
bee, pounded meteorite, piece of a tree a man committed 
suicide on, also a bone of his body, a piece of the body of a 
dead twin child, gall of lizard, soldier ants, etc., etc. 

The " hell- fetish " horn is pierced through the middle 
and set on an iron rod. It is then made to spin, and where 
it points as it stops spinning is the direction of the witch 
or wizard, who is promptly pounced on. 

Each witch doctor is an expert ventriloquist, which art 
he uses in calling up the spirits, and speaks and squeaks to 



86 The Man from Below 



them in imitation of the voices of the dead. His wives 
are many, well fed and chosen from the prettiest. They 
are also kept well in hand by fear of the poisoned cups of 
which their master knows so well the many ingredients, 
and how and when to administer them. His family is well 
clothed and obedient, for the father is rich, powerful, and 
prosperous, and a man of importance in the land. The 
death and burial of a witch doctor is a time of sorrow and 
much wailing as he is highly respected and greatly feared, 
besides being known over the length and breadth of the 
land as Yamasamha, " The Man from Below." 

Execution of an unqualified doctor. There is a Board 
composed of the head doctors in each district, and every 
practitioner must pass through the recognised initiation 
ceremonies and receive a diploma in the form of a hell- 
fetish, without which he may not pose as a doctor. Twenty- 
six years ago a man named Chefye set up as a doctor in the 
village of Chief Chisunka of the Chishinga country. He 
professed to have great power in smelling out witches and 
wizards, and any stooping, doting old man or woman he 
saw he accused of witchcraft and had them killed. One 
of his prospective victims denounced him as an impostor, 
and accused him of lying, divination, and practices, and of 
practising without official recognition from the Board of 
head doctors. He was tried by the above chief, found 
guilty of imposing on the public, and was hacked to pieces 
and burned to death as a false doctor and as a wizard. 

Makandwe, another native in Kazembe's country, also 
set himself up as a qualified doctor, but was found out and 
had to flee for his life elsewhere. He escaped the witch's 
death of burning owing to the European occupation of 
the country at that time. 



CHAPTER VIII 
Totemism, Exogamy & Taboo 

THERE are four divisions of society recognised 
throughout Bantu Africa : I. The tribe. 2. The 
clan. 3. The family. 4. The individual. Tribal 
interest ranks first, clan interest second, family interest 
follows, then last of all and least important comes the 
interest of the individual. Totemism is exclusively a clan 
distinction, and as there may be many clans in one tribe, 
so a clan is composed of many families, and each clan is 
known by its totem animal, bird, insect, vegetable, or 
mineral. 

Just as Kafir Socialism is seen in the life of a Bantu tribe, 
so in a lesser degree the out-workings of the same socialistic 
idea of society are seen in the grouping of families who form 
themselves into clans for social and protective purposes. 
These clans are each bound by laws whose basic object is to 
maintain strict exogamous relationships between members 
of the clans and to lay down which clans may intermarry 
and which clans may not, with formulated statements and 
reasons for and against. The maintenance of exogamy is 
the raison d'etre of the clan system, for all clansmen and 
also clanswomen are brothers and sisters. For a man to 
marry a woman of his own clan is equivalent to a man 
marrying his sister and vice versa. That is why an African 
traveller or trader is often nonplussed to understand his 
carriers meeting brothers and sisters in such distant and 
different parts of the country. If, e.g., a man of the 

87 



88 Totemism, Exogamy & Taboo 

elephant clan from Nyasaland should meet people of the 
elephant clan on the West Coast he is bound by clan laws 
to receive hospitality, is treated as a brother and may claim 
all the help of which he stands in need. I have seen my 
carriers meet a man of another caravan westward bound 
and watched one of them take off his shirt and give it to the 
needy clansman. " Why do you give away your shirt to a 
stranger ? " " He's not a stranger, white man, he's my 
brother." As it had happened again and again I laughed, 
saying, " Well, boys, you must have a lot of brothers." I 
did not then understand the totemistic reasons at back of 
this seeming philanthropy. " He's my brother, she's my 
sister," explains the clan idea, which is wider than the inner 
circle of family and blood relationship. 

If a man enters into an endogamous relationship pro- 
hibited by clan laws he is ostracised and becomes a social 
outcast, so much so that his own relatives will not visit him 
in sickness or attend his funeral if he dies. He has com- 
mitted incest, one of the most abhorred sins from the 
Bantu view-point. Tattooing the body, cicatrisation, hair- 
dressing, teeth chipping and filing or extraction have 
nothing whatever to do with the clan idea, but are exclu- 
sively tribal customs. The significance of clan totems is 
often an enigma to the outside and casual observer. Clan 
totems are exclusively used to distinguish the hundred and 
one different clans, and if, as in Europe, the Bantu negroes 
carried flags, as, e.g., the clans of Scotland used to do, these 
would bear a lion, buffalo, elephant, bee, ant, anthill, or 
whatever was the clan totem ; in the same way America 
flies the eagle, Britain the lion, Canada the maple leaf, 
Japan the rising sun, and the Chinese Empire the dragon. 
I have tried to get at the fundamental significance of 
totems, but as it seems to be a system dating from the 
remotest antiquity I have not been able to discover the 



Totemism, Exogamy &f Taboo 8g 

real reasons for the original choice of bird, animal, or insect, 
etc. There has been no new clan started within the 
memory of the present generation, so that the significance 
of totems is more or less shrouded in mystery and lies hid 
under the accretion of ages. 

A man of the elephant clan may marry a woman of the 
clay clan, because the elephant in crossing rivers digs up 
the clay on the banks with his tusk, and the clay clan uses 
it for making tobacco pipes, cooking pots, and water jars. 
The snake, field rat, and grass clans may intermarry, for the 
snake eats field rats, field rats eat grass, and the clay clan 
also eats grass. The fish, elephant, clay, grass, tortoise, 
goat, bird, rain, and a number of other clans may inter- 
marry, but none of these may marry members of the honey 
bee clan. 

The reason given is many hundreds of years old and to 
the effect that the heads of this clan, when the other clans 
were attacked and raided, bolted to the Wemba country 
and hid to save their skins. Prior to European adminis- 
tration, if a man of one of these clans had married a 
member of a bee clan he would have been killed for enter- 
ing a clan of cowards. Members of royal clans, as, e.g., the 
crocodile kings of Wembaland, the dog kings of Lundaland, 
and the war-drum kings of the Katanga, are not bound by 
clan laws and may marry women of any clan on the plea 
that " the king has no prohibitions," corresponding to our 
" the king can do no wrong." 

The elephant is a totem animal and is respected because 
of its great strength, lots of meat, and valuable ivory. 
Elephant is the synonym for ivory, and the chief and 
people are always glad to see ivory come to the kraal — 
hence the honour of membership in this clan. The lion 
is taken as a totem because it is strong and fierce and king 
of the forest. I remember a redeemed slave boy who put 



go Totemism, Exogamy Taboo 

his hands over his head and burst out crying because he was ! 
chastised for disobedience. He howled : " Oh ! think of 
my being punished, I who belong to the fierce lion clan." 
The buffalo is a totem animal because of its great quantity 1 
of beef and habit of going in compact herds. The leopard 
is totemised because of its beautiful skin and ability to 
defend itself. It is also able to take the offensive and does 
not hesitate to attack animals bigger than itself. 

The crocodile is the favourite totem of some royal 
clans, e.g., the Wemba in Rhodesia, and the Luena people 
in Angola. They were originally river people and always 
filed their teeth fish-shape in imitation of their totem 
animal. The croc is a great fish-eater, and most Bantus 
are fond of fish as a diet. I knew a fisherman on the 
Luapula who took the name of " the enemy of fish," of 
which he killed and ate large quantities. On one occasion he 
is reported to have eaten ten large eight-pounder fish, 
besides a large mess of porridge, and a pot of several gallons 
of beer as a wash down. He also boasted the name of 
" Glutton," and for a bet he ate a goat and a pot of 
porridge and drank a large gourd full of strong beer. He 
was a crony worthy of the Scottish Rab-Haw ! The eagle 
clan is proud of its totem bird, and on a member dying he 
will lament, " Oh ! I, an eagle who have flown so high." 
As the lion is considered the king of animals so the eagle is 
looked on as the king of birds. The eagle clan is held in 
high esteem and to belong to it gives status. The snake j 
is totemised because of its speed and cunning, also owing 
to its being greatly feared on account of its power to kill 
an enemy quickly. The African is naturally vindictive 
and revengeful, and envies, though he fears, the man who 
successfully deals in black magic. The field rat is a great 
delicacy and forms a favourite dish of minor venison, and 
unlike the house rat he is a clean feeder. The ant-hill clan 



Totemism, Exogamy <J!f Taboo 91 

like to build their huts and hamlets near these termitic 
structures. The wonderful village inside the ant-hill, the 
security and remarkable building power of the ant, their 
wisdom, and incidentally their edibility, make their hilly 
homes worthy to become a totemic distinction. Ant-hill 
soil is very fertile, having first been filtered through the 
bodies of the termites, and the clansmen get rich crops 
from this. The best Katanga and Rhodesian tobacco is 
grown on these ant-hills. Lake Bangweulu and the Luapula 
River is the home of the ant-hill clan. The clay clan chose 
its totem on account of the usefulness of clay. No clay, 
no tobacco pipes, cooking pots, or water jars. Many Bantu 
potters make a good living by their pottery, hence the value 
and necessity of clay. The bee and honey readily suggest the 
reason for their advancement to a place among the totems. 
Honey is much prized as a food, from it strong mead is 
brewed, and the wax is a valuable article of commerce. 

Taboos. Throughout Bantuland taboos are innumerable 
and tie the negro from head to foot on his progress from 
birth, through life, to death. Tribal taboos are peculiarly 
interesting because of their antiquity, and the reasons, 
physical and geographical, at the base of their existence. 
The Yeke tribe will not eat fish. They say that it is 
because it is slippery and sickly food, but I think the 
main reason is to be found in the fact that they were 
plain dwellers at the north end of Tanganyika, and were 
compelled to draw their water from wells, rarely seeing a 
fish or a river ; hence they made a virtue out of a neces- 
sity. Neither do they eat zebra meat ; this custom they 
may have acquired from the arabised natives with whom 
they lived and with whom they traded. 

The tribal taboos of the Wemba people are (i) Bush-pig ; 
(2) Bushbuck ; and (3) the Zebra. Th ese are forbidden 
to be eaten. 



92 Totemism, Exogamy & Taboo 

The Lunda tribe have no taboos. 

The system of taboos among clans as clans does not exist, 
and there are no distinctive clan taboos. 

Individual taboos are the most numerous, and it is 
difficult to find a native between the East and West Coasts 
who has not one or other personal taboo which he regards 
as vital to his life and well-being. Taboos in Bantu mean 
" principle," and a " man of no principles " or " an un- 
principled man " is called a mulyelye, or, " a man who eats 
anything " — a man without taboos. 

If a woman is pregnant and aborts again and again, and 
abortion becomes a " habit," the doctor is called in. He 
comes, diagnoses the case, and makes up fetish medicines 
which he puts into a duiker horn and gives it to her to be 
worn round her neck. Then he imposes the following 
taboos : 

(1) You must not eat mudfish. 

(2) You must not drink strong beer. 

(3) You must only eat at home. 

(4) You must not get fire to light your own from any 
neighbour's house. 

(5) You must not lend your bed or bedding. 

(6) You must not lend your baskets to any other woman. 

When she gives birth to a child successfully and the 
baby cuts his first tooth the same family doctor is again 
called to the house. He comes and examines his patient, 
then takes her to the river, shaves her head and bathes her. 
Then she catches a mudfish which she holds in her teeth. 
It is brought home and cooked, also porridge, and she eats 
a meal publicly. After this the doctor removes all the 
previous six taboos and she resumes her normal life and 
diet. 

If a man is accused of sterility his friends go off into the 



Totemism, Exogamy ®P Taboo 93 

bush and search for medicines for him of three kinds : 
(1) Medicine to drink ; (2) medicine to chew ; (3) and 
medicine to smoke in a pipe. Then two taboos are im- 
posed : (1) Don't eat mudfish. (2) Don't drink strong 
beer. If after this treatment his wife subsequently con- 
ceives and bears a child the taboos are removed and normal 
life is resumed. If a mother is under a number of taboos 
the child is similarly tabooed until it cuts its first teeth 
and is therefore justified, when normal life is resumed. 

Spirit kings and queens (those supposed to be possessed 
by the spirits of departed kings and queens) on beginning 
their professional life are taken aside by their elders and 
instructors, when the imposition of a certain number of 
taboos is formally made. These are more severe. 

(1) Don't eat mush, or porridge. 

(2) Don't drink beer. 

(3) Don't eat chicken. 

(4) Don't eat mudfish. 

(5) Don't eat rabbit. 

(6) Don't eat tortoise (some natives are very fond of 
tortoise). 

(7) Don't eat zebra meat. 

(8) Don't eat bushbuck. 

These taboos are in force only during ecstatic performances 
and when under the influence of demon possession, which 
usually lasts five or six days. After this the taboos are re- 
moved and normal life is resumed. 

A leper who seeks medical help is tabooed as follows : 

(1) Don't eat mudfish (natives are very fond of this). 

(2) Don't eat bloody meat. 

(3) Don't drink strong beer. 

(4) Only eat at your own house. 

(5) Must not go into the house of another. 



94 Totemism, Exogamy & Taboo 

Then the doctor gives him medicine to drink. He also i 
gets medicinal leaves and rubs them on the leprous sores, 
causing a blister. He opens the blister and puts a medicinal 
paste on the sores ; if the medicine " catches," the leper 
recovers. When he recovers the taboos are removed and 
he resumes normal life. 

If a man contracts syphilis the doctor is called, and 
among other things he imposes the following four taboos : 

(1) Don't eat mudfish. 

(2) Don't drink strong beer. 

(3) Don't eat chicken. 

(4) Don't eat raw meat. 

If he recovers his mother goes and digs roots and obtains 
castor oil. The herbal medicine is powdered and with the 
oil made into a paste which is rubbed on the body. The 
mother makes beer and cooks chicken and fresh meat and 
fish with which he is fed, after which all the taboos are 
removed. 

Hunter's taboos affect also the hunter's wife, and the 
laws pertaining to success in the chase are numerous and 
intricate. Inviolate faithfulness of husband and wife 
during the former's absence in the hunting field is one of 
the first and most important laws for hunters if they are 
to have luck. If a woman is unfaithful during her hunter 
husband's absence, the hunter is exposed to failure, danger 
from wild animals, and even death. If the elephant charges 
and the hunter is killed, the woman is tried for murder 
on the ground of concealed adultery and breaking the 
taboo, and is at once executed. A young hunter on his 
first hunt may not eat the game he kills until the older 
hunter arrives and feeds him with a piece of meat cooked 
in a medicine. After this he may eat when and where he 
likes. To give reasons for the hundred and one taboos 



Totemism, Exogamy & Taboo 9 5 

of Bantu peoples would be as difficult as to provide 
satisfactory explanations of the Talmud, or the old Levitical 
laws of Taboo in regard to what may or what may not be 
eaten (vide Leviticus, Chap. XI.) I fancy the initial 
explanation of this intricate network of Taboo laws is 
to be found in the undoubted Semitic origin of the Bantu 
people. When one asks, " Why is so-and-so tabooed ? " 
the invariable answer one gets is this : " Please, sir, these 
are our customs," or, " We follow our ancestors' steps. 5 ' 
The penalty for breaking a taboo is sickness, and even 
death, plus the dire displeasure of the spirits and clansmen. 
A man who would do this is looked on as " void of prin- 
ciple," is despised, called all sorts of vile names, and there 
are those who would not hesitate to poison or spear him. 
Very often the sickness on account of which the taboos 
have been imposed is brought back in a more severe form 
as the result of breaking them. A man who breaks a taboo, 
if it becomes publicly known, is branded as a social outcast, 
just as a man would be among Arabs and Jews who ate pig. 
These old Bantu laws of Totemism, Exogamy, and Taboo 
are as old as the Mosaic economy — perhaps older — and 
strike their roots back thousands of years into the dim, 
distant history of the world. Even the modern educated 
Bantu negro is as ignorant of the whence, why, and where- 
fore of much of these old-world codes as the ordinary 
modern Jew is of the meaning of the collection of miscel- 
laneous laws found in the Talmud. 



CHAPTER IX 



Secret Societies &* Guilds 

BUTWA A LEADING SECRET SOCIETY IN RHODESIA 

THE Batwa people of Lake Bangweulu are one of 
five Bantu tribes scattered over a large part of 
Africa and bearing — with phonetic variations — 
the same name. These Batwa are one of the few Central 
African tribes about which little or nothing is known. 
They inhabit the marshes at the south end of the lake 
and live mainly on fish and antelope flesh. They cultivate 
the ground around the ant-hills that spring up here and 
there throughout the marshes, and on other raised patches 
they grow, at the end of the dry season, meagre crops of 
cereals and root foods. As they do not produce, however, 
a tithe of the food necessary for their support they trade 
their sun-dried fish and smoked antelope flesh with their 
land neighbours for meal and grain. 

As to the other four Batwa tribes, I know nothing at 
first hand, either of their language or literature. All the 
information I possess concerning them is of a geographical 
nature and to the effect that 

Batwa No. i live in Damaraland. 

Batwa No. 2 find their habitat among the swamps of 
the Kafue River in N.W. Rhodesia. 

Batwa No. 3 reside in the Kameruns. 

Batwa No. 4 are the pigmies of the Aruwimi forests and 
swamps on the Upper Congo, while our local friends, 

96 



Secret Societies & Guilds 97 



Batwa No. 5, live amongst the marshes at the south end 
of Lake Bangweulu. 

The Bangweulu Batwa, amongst whom I have travelled 
and worked for about two decades, off and on, form the 
subject of this chapter. They are primarily a water-people, 
very timid and conservative, and their full local appellation 
as a tribe is Batwa-Menda, or the " Water-Beaters," owing 
to the fact that they spend the greater part of their time 
in canoes, paddling about among the swamps, fishing and 
hunting. They are also known locally as the Bana-Nika, 
which in common parlance signifies " River Children," 
and their country, if the agglomeration of marshes and 
ant-hills amongst which they live can be justly denominated 
a country, is called Manika, or " The Land of Rivers." 

Philologically, their language belongs to the Bantu 
family, and is one of an allied group of fifteen dialects, 
mutually intelligible, and spoken throughout the greater 
part of N.E. Rhodesia, part of N.W. Rhodesia, and in the 
south-eastern corner of the Congo State. Their claim to 
separate and special consideration here is due to their 
being the founders and, generally, members of a powerful 
Secret Society, designated " Butwa." The question whether 
the society name " Butwa " sprang from the tribal name 
" Batwa " or vice versa is a moot one, and of no immediate 
importance. The word " Butwa," etymologically, is 
made up of two parts, consisting of prefix and stem. 
The prefix " Bu-" is a qualificative one, and contains the 
idea of " Society," whereas " -Twa," the stem, is a word 
in almost universal use throughout the greater part of 
Central Africa. " -Twa " is the root of the verb ku-twa^ 
meaning, primarily, " to pound meal," and secondarily 
" to pound anything " in a mortar with a pestle — an African 
custom in vogue since the days of Herodotus. Like most 
African words, it has its metaphorical as well as its material 

G 



g 8 Secret Societies &* Guilds 

uses, and is put very severely into practice metaphorically 
if, perchance, a hapless exoteric should venture too near 
the Butwa temples while a service is being held ! 

Butwa is an old institution, though different in form 
from other mysteries. I suggest an alternate etymology 
which for years has seemed to me the true and possibly 
the original one, namely, that Butwa is derived from the 
verb buta (root but-), much used by neighbouring tribes, 
and meaning " to cover up," " to cover over " (with the 
idea of hiding) and bears the meaning of the Greek verb 
kalypto. The suffix wa indicates the passive voice, and 
together the root but- and the suffix wa mean " the hidden 
thing," " the mystery " ; the noun being used in both 
singular and plural, should be translated here plurally, 
and signifies " the mysteries," the exact name given to 
the Greek Eleusinian cult. It is by no means easy, however, 
to exhume from under the accretion of ages the original 
significance of such a word. 

Butwa is likewise a distinct cult, possessing Initiatory 
Rites, Ceremonies, and Temple Services, with life secrets 
imposed at initiation. Its members speak an esoteric 
language known only to the initiated, and called Lubendo. 
Ability to Benda or speak this cryptic speech is looked 
upon as a sure mark of a member of the Society.. This 
speech finds its counterpart in European argots, and is 
formed variously : sometimes by transposing the syllables 
of a common word, e.g. kasaka for kakasa, meaning " a 
little foot " ; again, by changing an initial letter, e.g. 
Temuka for Semuka, 66 to be demon-possessed," or by 
introducing an obsolete word, as Tambe, an archaic name 
for " God " ; sometimes by a compound metaphorical 
word such as Busankabemba, meaning " The Lake- 
Sprinkler," which is a secret word for " water." 

The female members of Butwa form themselves into 



Secret Societies &* Guilds gg 



singing bands, and to the accompaniment of a native banjo 
called Cbansa, peculiar to the cult, they carry on nocturnal 
concerts which are usually accompanied by wild dancing. 
Like most Bantu tribes they are Totemic, many of them 
belonging to the ant-hill clan, perhaps most of them. 
Like most African tribes, also, their Totemism, in its main 
idea, is exogamic, and is intended to control marriage 
relationships outside certain circles to avoid consanguinity. 
It has nothing whatever to do with worship, as used to be 
thought. 

I shall now proceed to discuss Butwa roughly under 
four heads : 

x. Its Membership. 2. Its Constitution. 
3. Its Aims. 4. Its Influence. 

1. The members of this Society are generally found 
among the water-peoples, though of recent years some 
land tribes have built Butwa temples, called in Butwa priests, 
and initiated young and old, establishing lodges over a 
large part of the adjoining mainland. Its membership 
is promiscuous, made up of both sexes and all ages. Central 
and branch lodges are found on both banks of the Southern 
Chambesi River, that runs into Lake Bangweulu, all round 
the lake, and on its thirty islands, also among the marshes 
occupied by the Ba-Unga on the east, and by the Batwa 
at the south end of the lake and along the entire length 
of the Luapula-Congo as far as Lake Mweru, on both the 
British and Belgian sides. The chief Nkuba — originally 
of Kilwa Island on Lake Mweru — whom I have known 
intimately for years, is the recognised introducer of Butwa 
throughout these parts, and his name is famous in many 
a Butwa song. The tribes affected by the cult on North 
Bangweulu are the Ba-Bisa and Ba-Unga. At the south end 
and on the western side are the Ba-Twa and Ba-Ushi. 



ioo Secret Societies Guilds 



These, with the Ba-Lamba and Ba-Lunda along the 
Luapula, with the Ba-Shila and a few Ba-Bemba and 
Ba-Itabwa around Lake Mweru, form the entire Butwa 
community of these parts. 

Lodges with a flourishing membership are to be found 
some thirty to sixty miles inland from both river and lakes, 
and everywhere a marked enthusiasm is evidenced for 
Butwa, while its power is felt in every relationship of life. 
Many divorces are annually sought and obtained because 
of the treatment of husband or wife when he or she is a 
non-member. This is due to the refusal of one or other 
to join the Society. The non-member has frequently 
to submit to the insulting language of the other spouse, 
while the whole Society backs husband or wife in the 
endeavour of either to convert the obstinate partner. 
The only possible solution is divorce. Of a husband who 
resists his wife's entreaties to become a member the follow- 
ing sarcastic ditty is sung : 

Song of the Obstinate Spouse : " The husband at home, 

He lies in a heap, 
Like a pig, in a pile." 

id est, he sleeps alone while his wife is enjoying herself 
in the Butwa camp. 

Young boys and girls are stripped, at and after initiation, 
of all sense of shame, and the latter, as will be seen later, 
are forced to submit to gross indignities. Here also they 
gain their first lessons in sexual immorality. Even babies 
are initiated and as they grow up are gradually instructed, 
until in mature years they become full members, when they 
are introduced to the whole arcana of Butwa. 

2. To speak of the constitution of Butwa I shall have to 
avail myself of a paper written for me in the native language 
by an ex-witch doctor. I here give the translation as 
literally as English will allow. 



Secret Societies &* Guilds 101 



Initiation ceremonies. Firstly, on initiating people into 
the Butwa Society, chief's dung is gathered and dog's dung ; 
parings of the feet of the crocodile, the elephant, the 
armadillo, the tortoise, and the scorpion, besides herbal 
medicines of various kinds. Pulverised crystal is also added. 
The whole is then put into a pot with the powdered crystal, 
and boiled together. When this is done, the first novice 
is given a drink out of the pot in this manner : He or she 
is seized hand and foot by the priests and taken inside a hut, 
where the initiation drink is administered. At this point 
all strike up a song : 

" Oh, come and drink, 
Ye mother's children, come and drink ! 
If any stay away 

He's the child of a slave, let him stay." 

Now the pot is passed round and all the initiates drink, 
whereupon the priest gives each a new name, saying, 
" Now your name is c Ferryman.' " They then continue 
singing and dancing throughout the whole night. Those 
who have brought their children for initiation cook messes 
of porridge and chickens, and make beer, with which the 
feast continues. Thus the night is spent. After a few 
days have passed and the new moon appears, all — both men 
and women — become spirit-possessed and speak oracularly. 
On returning the dishes in which the food for the feast 
has been brought, the young people beg from those who 
prepared the feast, while they strike up a song : 

<c In the hospitable home 
May there never lack food. 
Ye mothers of the Ferryman 
Bring out your food." 

The women give them food and they answer, saying, " I 
bow the knee to the mothers of Butwa." The women 
reply, " Arise a perfect Butwa member and look out for 



io2 Secret Societies &* Guilds 



scorpions." They now turn about and go back. At this 
point the Butwa Temple is built and all the members 
prepare to remove there. 

At the cross-roads fetish medicine is laid down and 
the place is given a name. " This is the Kaminsamanga," 
is said. The remainder of the food they are eating is 
thrown down here. Here, also, a bower is made of two 
saplings, the large ends of which are inserted into the 
ground, the small ends being bent in towards the centre, 
where they unite, forming an arch. Each initiate must pass 
through this arch before entering the temple. On passing 
through, each hangs his Butwa fet'.Ji over the bower 
as it may not be carried into the temple. Reaching the 
temple, they strike up a song : 

" Oh, Travellers ! 
Oh, Travellers ! 
This is the music, 
Oh, listen all." 

Leaving the cross-roads they sing another song : 

" No need to point out the path, 
Butwa itself shall lead the way." 

" Ad finem, ad templum ingrediens cum initiatis, unus 
ex eis, sed homo in maj estate constitutus (ordinarie 
unus ex presbyteris) sibi puellam eligit et dicit c genuflecte, 
initiate, et medicinam accipe.' Puella consentit et presbyter 
earn publice polluit, statim omnes praesentes de adulterio 
conveniunt." 

While this is going on, the elder Butwa priestesses bring 
in beer with cooked porridge and chickens, while a cryptic 
song is sung which runs thus : 

" Hurrah ! hurrah ! Oh, hurrah, Sir ! 
We who give the fetish-horns, 
We twist up your tongue, you are tied. 
Oh, hurrah ! hurrah ! " 



Secret Societies & Guilds 103 



id est, you are now subject to Butwa secrets and may not 
speak. 

The following day they prepare for the final grand 
ceremonies of the Butwa festival, when every one is dressed 
up fantastically and painted with stripes to represent zebras, 
while the whole camp dances all night. The favourite bird 
of the Batwa is the crested crane, whose antics and call they 
imitate in their dances. 

At dawn the following day the chief priests and priestesses 
call the " mothers of the crystal fetish," gather the initiates 
together, and compound for each a fetish-horn. Some 
receive two, some three, and even four. Another song is 
struck up : 

" Be quick and get on the white paint, 
The king's drums are sounding, 
The drums are sounding, sounding, 
Quick and put on the white paint." 

All then smear white chalk over their bodies, while the 
" mothers of the crystal fetish " instruct them, saying, 
" On no account must you reveal the secrets to the un- 
initiated. On no account must you speak of the proceed- 
ings and of what you have been doing here." Then 
" the mothers of the Butwa mysteries " bring out articles, 
including pots of beer, calico, hoes, beads, and other 
things — the temple initiation fees. Drums strike up 
boisterously now, and all join in a wild war-dance, while 
the following song is sung, stooping as they dance to pick 
up the various things lying all over the ground : 

" Oh ! this the place 
Where we pick up the good things " (repeated again and again). 

When the dancing is finished, the ceremonies end, and all 
scatter to their villages. 

The priesthood or council of Butwa officers is composed 



104 Secret Societies & Guilds 



of five or more elders of each sex, who wear special dress and 
bear special names. Here are a few of the names of both 
sexes : 

Bainangulu 

(Or mothers of the crystal fetish). 

Men. Women. 

Katumpa Buyamha 

Chimundu Katempa 

Luongo Ngohola 

Shinini (ya mukulakulu) Chaho 

Kasumpa Luhuta 

These are looked up to as the organisers and officers of the 
cult meetings, and take charge of the initiates, giving the 
Chiholo or initiatory drink. Each of these has his or her 
band of initiates, from whom they receive recognised fees 
for their services at initiation. They also claim to possess 
magical powers, and terrorise the young members into 
obedience by threats of witchcraft which they sometimes 
put into practice. Each Inangulu looks on his or her band 
of initiates hereafter as his or her " fetish children," 
bana. hd hzodngd. 

3. The aims of the Butwa in the individual are to 
suppress selfishness and to promote social life. The chief 
attractions are dancing, singing, concerts, beer-drinks, and 
sexual licence. Lubendo, or the ability to speak the secret 
language of Butwa, is, I am told, another much-coveted 
acquisition. From the family standpoint, Butwa cements 
members by means of a common tie. Sometimes a recal- 
citrant son or daughter is found who refuses to be initiated. 
When such happens, life is made unbearable, and the 
stubborn child becomes the subject of mocking jest and 
covert raillery in song. 

Socially, Butwa resembles a club whose members are 



Secret Societies &* Guilds 105 



bound by common rules. While services are in progress, 
processions are the order of each day. To draw water at the 
river, collect firewood in the forest, all go in procession, 
singing and dancing as they go. Even going to the bush for 
necessary purposes, all — men, women, and children — go 
in procession, and no sense of shame is attached to any 
necessity, while no privacy is observed or allowed. A 
man may have sexual intercourse with his mother, sister, 
his nearest relative, even to his own daughter. However, 
this licence becomes null and void outside the temple 
precincts, and immediately after the final ceremony of 
Subula. 

Politically, Butwa is a tremendous force to be reckoned 
with. Its unity gives it power, so that headmen of villages, 
to safeguard and ingratiate themselves with their people, 
if not already members, become members on assuming 
chieftainship. 

4. The influence of Butwa from a purely native stand- 
point is beneficial, with its feasting, drinking, and orgies. 
Its help in sickness or need, with the prospects of a respect- 
able funeral and worship after death is much to be desired* 
On the other hand, looking at it from a Government point 
of view, Butwa is decidedly and grossly immoral, besides 
being contrary to good citizenship in any form, e.g., in 
the year 1909, when the Luapula River had been closed to 
traffic, owing to sleeping sickness regulations, certain snakes 
were said to have appeared in some villages on the river- 
bank. These it was reported were sent by Songa, a powerful 
local deity, who, they said, was very angry because Butwa 
ceremonies and his worship had fallen into neglect. He 
ordered them to be revived at once and that all Batwa 
who wished for a successful harvest must send to him to have 
their seeds blessed. This order led to the wholesale secret 
infringement of Government regulations, by chiefs and 



io6 Secret Societies {§f Guilds 



people alike. In some places, where they failed to cross 
the river surreptitiously, they did not cultivate, dreading 
the Songa's curse, and hunger ensued. Butwa is powerful, 
and a man or woman or child, presuming to change and 
become a Christian, exposes himself to the dangerous 
shafts of the whole Butwa fraternity. Non-members are 
not interfered with, but all members are bound by the 
sacred drink to stand by the rules of the Society, and never, 
under penalty of death, to divulge its secrets. 

A person who has been initiated, " dies Butwa," and is 
" born again." He is so much a re-born man that, on return- 
ing to village life, he has to be introduced to his father and 
mother and relatives,- whom he is supposed, and pretends, 
not to know. 



CHAPTER X 



Secret Societies & Guilds {continued) 

SECRET Societies and Guilds permeate the whole 
fabric of village life. In the last chapter I gave a 
description in detail of an African secret society with 
an account of its peculiar significance, and, from material I 
have gathered, what applies to " Butwa " applies funda- 
mentally and with trivial modification to most other 
societies. " Bumbuli " is also, or rather used to be, a very 
powerful society composed of both male and female 
members. It belongs for the most part to the Luba tribe 
and was introduced by them into a corner of N. Rhodesia 
by " Kazembe " and his people, who came originally from 
the West like the Wemba. Owing to fear of the Govern- 
ment, it is not active in Rhodesia to-day, but is still going 
strong in the South Luba country and the Katanga. It 
has temples, with a priesthood, initiatory rites, and cere- 
monies, with periodical services the same as Butwa. Singing 
and dancing, with orgies, play a large part in the services, 
and no outsider may approach the temple precincts while 
services are in progress. Death is the penalty for divulging 
the society's secrets. I have seen its activities in the district 
where I lived many years ago, and only recently have I 
succeeded in obtaining definite, reliable information, 
which is as follows : 

For initiation purposes a pit some five feet deep, by 
four feet wide, is dug at the side of the village, and this is 
covered over by leafy branches in the centre of which a 



io8 Secret Societies Guilds 



hole is left to introduce the hand and arm of each initiate. 
A doctor is hidden in the hole who is declared to be a 
" giant tortoise." Each novice coming forward puts in 
his or her hand, which is promptly seized and held by the 
" tortoise." The hand is dragged down bit by bit, and, 
speaking in a squeaky " spirit voice," the " tortoise " makes 
each novice confess his or her misdeeds : namely, " witch- 
craft," " theft," " adultery," etc. The other members 
gathered round, in jest and song taunt the novices and 
tease them with sarcastic remarks and wicked imputations, 
such as : 

" Confess your thefts " {W at and a Izvibo), 

" Confess your witchcrafts " (Watanda buti!), 
— and don't hide anything you have done from the " tortoise 
in the hole " (Lolo hombe). These confessions are inviolate 
to the society. Thereupon, the initiate confesses all, during 
which confession he or she is terrified by threats emanating 
from the unearthly voice in the hole. The initiatory drink 
is then given, and the initiated person at once " dies 
Bumbuli," lying on the ground unconscious. To restore 
" new life " to each, the chief doctor tramps on the head 
and foot of the initiate, and brings them back to life, giving 
to each reborn person a new name. After this ceremony 
drums are brought out, and all present perform a war-dance, 
while the novices stand in the centre, each with a spear in 
hand. Above is done at the conclusion of the service. 

" Kasanshi " or " Buyembe " is another powerful society 
belonging to the Luba and Western Lake Mweru people, 
and used to be very active among the hill villages over- 
looking the lake. 

It is the only one I know which has definite cannibal 
rites and ceremonies. They build their temples in dark 
forest groves, where they carry out their initiatory rites 
and ceremonies, with initiation " death drink," after drinking 



Secret Societies & Guilds 109 



which they are brought back to life and get new names. 
They dig up dead bodies which they cook and eat, with 
wild drumming and cannibal orgies. They wear two skins 
of the Impala antelope, one in front and one behind. 
They dance to the music of long, round drums and rattles. 
They practise black magic, and terrorise the districts where 
they live. They also have a knowledge of the healing art, 
and know many useful drugs with which they practise, 
receiving good fees. Their fetishes and medicines are so 
numerous that they use exceptionally large baskets called 
chife cha fisoko. When the new moon appears, they 
become spirit-possessed, and set off on ghoulish journeys 
to dig up dead bodies for their feasts. They have also a 
notoriety for stripping recently buried bodies of cloth, 
ivory, copper and brass ornaments, and all bodily dress 
and decorations. One of these, named Chishishila, who 
lived in Kazembe's district (and I am told still lives) is one 
of the most notorious of these ghouls, who regularly digs 
up and strips newly buried bodies. He was driven out of 
the village and lives by himself in the bush now with his 
two wives. It is reported that he stripped the body of the 
old Kazembe and also of his queen, Ina Kafwaya. He goes 
to the graves with his Buyembe fetish and " calls out " 
the dead man or woman, after which he strips them of 
everything and orders them back to their graves. In 
calling them he uses the " Umbilical name " given at 
birth. He was found out owing to his having sold, for 
beer, etc., the clothes and ornaments of people who were 
dead. Many recognised the articles of dress and the decora- 
tions formerly worn by relatives who had died. They are 
afraid of him, I am told, which is the reason they refuse to 
denounce him and his vampire practices. This cannibal 
society is strong in the West Mweru district and the neigh- 
bouring Itabwa country. 



no Secret Societies &* Guilds 



" Bulindu " is another secret society composed exclu- 
sively of females. The founder of this society was a 
chieftainess at the north end of Lake Mweru named Ina- 
Chituti, and the following story is told which gives its 
origin and foundation. She had a son named Chituti who 
was boorish, disrespectful to his parents, and who lost no 
opportunities to misbehave and insult his elders. The 
mother warned him again and again, but to no purpose. 
One day she went on a prolonged visit to friends at the 
south end of the lake, leaving the boy's uncle in charge. 
When she returned she found that the uncle had killed 
her son, skinned him, stretched and dried the skin in the 
sun, and was using it as a mat to sit on. She was so angry 
that she planned and founded this society, getting together 
a number of leading local women to uphold women's 
mother-rights and to protect themselves from the tyranny 
of men. This also had its initiation ceremonies and fetish 
medicine on which the cult was built. This society has 
also a secret rite which is performed on the initiation of 
young girls, mildly corresponding to circumcision. The 
instrument used is the sawlike claw of a large caterpillar. 
This society is the cause of much divorce, as is Butwa, for 
the women often spend months away from their homes 
attending the temple services. 

It is exclusively a women's society, and is still powerful 
throughout the Katanga. 

In Bihe, Angola, when I was there, there was in exist- 
ence a very powerful society of secret service police called 
" Olongumbu." As far as I know and could learn, their 
duties were — among others — to warn and, if necessary, 
punish those who committed any acts contrary to social and 
tribal custom, or who refused to obey the ordinary con- 
stituted authorities. For example, if a man who had been 
again and again warned by his fellows for reprehensible 



Secret Societies &? Guilds in 



conduct refused to listen, a complaint was lodged by those 
concerned before the officers of the Olongumbu cult. 
These would go to the offender's house at night and call 
him outside, and if he refused to come they would burst 
his door open and drag him out and flog him, warning him 
not to repeat such and such an offence. If the offence was 
repeated certain Olongumbu police, deputed by their 
superiors, would again knock him up another night, drag 
him out of his house, and punish him severely. They were 
even vested with power to carry out the death penalty. 
This society was recognised by chiefs and people, and had 
a wholesome effect in maintaining good behaviour and 
keeping the people law-abiding. Like other societies it 
had its abuses. 

On the Luapula River and in the Fort Rosebery district 
of Northern Rhodesia there exists a strong and much- 
dreaded robber society called Kabwalala. The name is 
s compounded of two parts, Kabzoa, " a dog," and Lata, 
" to sleep." They claim to possess a potent fetish medicine, 
. which they sprinkle round a village or house before they 
commence to plunder the owners. The fetish is supposed 
[ to drug the dogs and people and send them off to sleep. 
s Hence its name of " Dogs go to sleep." I knew the 
founder of this society, whose name was Kunda Shinanga, 
J u pigeon doctor," and twenty-two years ago he accom- 
panied me out East on the journey referred to in Chapter 
, XXVI. He was a big, ugly, pock-marked fellow, and 
j lazy, and was a member of the Ushi tribe in Rhodesia. It 
; : was he who discovered and compounded this sleeping 
fetish, which is kept in an antelope horn and worn next the 
jj body. Years ago a band of six of these attacked a mission 
r station, on which occasion the senior missionary nearly 
JB 'lost his life. It happened in this way. During the dark 
; early hours of the morning they ascended the hill and 



ii2 Secret Societies &P Guilds 



entered the white men's bedrooms while they were asleep 
in bed, went through room after room, and carried off in 
all some six loads of goods. One of the missionaries, 
awaking out of sleep, in spite of the robbers' fetish, heard 
a step outside his window and thought it was a hyena. 
Seizing his rifle and three cartridges he stepped out lightly 
on to the verandah of his house and hid in the shadow. 
In a few minutes he saw the figure of a man passing with 
stealthy motion. He gave the man the usual native chal- 
lenge, at which he bolted. The European sprang off the 
verandah after him and fired, shouting, " Stop, or I'll shoot 
again." The robber, who was naked and oiled and had a 
big spear in his hand, refused to stop, and continued 
running. My friend fired again, calling to him to stop, but 
he kept running. He fired a third time, meaning to wing 
him, but missed. At this the thief swerved and fell on a 
heap of stones with the European on top of him. They 
got into grips, and there was a fierce struggle. The robber 
shouted, " Let me go, white man, or I'll kill you," and 
tried to stab him in the back with the spear. The white 
man got his hands badly cut, and as his strength was nearly 
gone, he suddenly remembered a native Ju-Jitsu trick, 
which he performed and doubled the man clean up. He 
dropped his spear, shouting, " White man, I'm done." 
The missionary hung on to him till others, who heard the 
shooting, located them, and rushed to the rescue. The 
case was tried by a Belgian judge, and the robber got a 
long term of imprisonment. On the way to undergo his 
sentence in a Lower Congo prison, he terrified the guards 
who had charge of him, declaring himself a great wizard, 
and they let him go. The last word I heard was that he 
had murdered a man on the Luapula River shortly after- 
wards. A short time ago, at the police station in Elisabeth- 
ville, Katanga, I saw a gang of prisoners, and eight or ten 



o CO 



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" g 

« H 

p W 

<j 
w 

a 

w 

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Pi 

O 

m 
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Secret Societies &* Guilds 113 



loads, including tents and travelling equipment. On 
enquiry I found out that it was a small band of Kabwalala 
robbers who had plundered a white man's camp, and had 
been rounded up by the police near Sakania on the Anglo- 
Belgian border. 

Members of all these societies have cryptic signs by which 
they recognise each other, and a man who, when challenged, 
fails to give the countersign is put down as a fraud and 
disowned. They also have a secret language which is only 
a matter of transposition of letters or syllables. I have 
heard it spoken and recognised words here and there, 
though I failed to follow a conversation. These corre- 
spond to European argots. Societies like the foregoing 
represent the bulk of native society life, and are a great 
attraction, as well as being a powerful political factor 
which can be brought into play at any critical juncture in 
the life of the tribe. 

Every trade and profession has its guild, hunters and 
fishermen, iron and copper workers, workers in leather and 
workers in wood, as well as doctors of every branch of fetish- 
craft and medicine. Musicians, hunters, etc., and even 
robbers have their protective guilds. Every one of these 
has for its foundation a particular fetish horn, or set of 
fetishes, with certain initiation ceremonies and rites. They 
have their club and temple meetings at specified times, 
and each has a particular set of rules to govern the relations 
of members to each other and to uninitiated outsiders. 
They each have their signs and countersigns by which they 
know each other, and at initiation each is supplied by the 
guild officers with a distinct fetish insignia which must be 
worn at all meetings. The promise of the members to 
stand by and help each other in need, is as binding as any 
rule enforced by European friendly societies, to which, in 
;ome respects, these African societies correspond. Members 



ii4 Secret Societies & Guilds 



must attend and do the honours of the guild at members' 
funerals, and also attend officially and join in the worship 
of a defunct member at the spirit temples. No A frican 
dies utterly^ as they express it, fzvililila, for to the negro 
death is not annihilation, but a mere continuation chamber 
in which reincarnation is awaited, and in the interim the 
living honour the dead by acts of worship. Instrumental 
music and singing are two of the chief forms of social life 
indulged in by all secret societies and guilds, and there are 
sets of songs peculiar to each. 

Coppersmith's Song 

" Work and toil, my brother, 
Oh yes, for work is good. 
If it's your own little job, my brother, 
Work, for work is good." 

Song of the Blacksmith 

" I fell at Kampanda River, 
With the metal in my hand, 
While breaking up the iron charms, 
By which I bought my freedom. 
I'm the man who tramps the marshes. 
All chiefs' sons are the same. 
Ivory rings and bracelets 
Belong to the ' grass-clan ' men. 

The Smith, Oh thanks to the Doctor, 
Who helps him in his work. 
He sings the song of plenty, 
With his bins and baskets full, 
With his beer pot never empty, 
And a quiet life on a stool. 

Wealth is not on the surface. 
A lazy man never gets any. 
The blacksmith, with his sledge, 
He hammers out the money." 

(Rhodesian Blacksmiths belong to the Grass Clan.) 



Secret Societies &* Guilds 115 



One of trie most powerful guilds is that of trie Lion 
Doctor. They claim to have potent fetishes by means of 
which they can " throw lions " all over the country as an 
American " throws a gun." They claim also the power of 
practising lycanthropy, or changing into lions, and they 
travel all over the forest followed, the natives say and 
believe, by troops of " dogs," as they call the lions, euphem- 
istically. These lions are said to obey the slightest behest 
of their " lion masters." 

I have known several of these lion experts who, for a 
certain price, will rid any fellow tribesman or chief of his 
troublesome enemies. They also claim the power to recall 
the lions after they have done their work. They profess 
to have power also to rid a district of lions. (Negro Pied 
Pipers.) 

Lions, of course, must never be called " lions " but 
" dogs," just as in crossing a river infested with crocodiles 
they are alluded to as " lizards." The Greeks had this 
thought in mind when they called the roughest sea beyond 
the Mediterranean the Euxine, i.e. the sea friendly to 
strangers. 

The paramount chief whose name was Chama and in 
whose district I lived on Lake Bangweulu was a far-famed 
lion doctor, and he lived on the edge of a marsh. He was 
a big, powerful man, with a weird, wicked expression such 
as one might find in an ancient book of ogres. When at 
home he disliked the light and usually huddled in dark 
corners during the day. A local youth whom I knew had 
been out one day honey-hunting near some of Chama's 
fenced gardens. The fire he had been using to smoke the 
bees he left behind, and it caught the dry grass and burnt 
down the fence of Chama's cornfield. The lad fled and hid 
in his village. News went round that some one had burned 
Chama's fence, but the culprit had disappeared. The 



1 1 6 Secret Societies & Guilds 



same night two lions (or what appeared to be two lions) 
roared till morning round the village where the lad lived. 
Next day, scared to death, he hastened to Chama's village 
and confessed his guilt, and had to pay a most extortionate 
fine that nearly ruined him. Twenty- three miles from 
there a lion had been giving a lot of trouble, and the 
suspicion fell on a certain man who claimed powers of 
lycanthropy. They could not catch him, and the village 
was in terror of being attacked by this lion whose nocturnal 
visits and roaring drove everybody indoors after sundown. 
The local magistrate came to collect taxes in that village 
and the people told him about it. He decided to sit 
up and have a pot at the man-eater. He had not long 
to wait, for after dark the usual lion roaring was heard. 
He noted the direction from whence the sound came, and 
seeing a dark form, he fired, and felt assured he had hit 
it for he heard groans. Next day, however, they traced 
the blood spoor to a hut, and crouching inside was the 
man in question with a bullet wound through the leg. 
On another occasion, with my colleague and some natives, 
I was walking along the British bank of the Luapula River 
when we heard what we thought was the roaring of a lion. 
The boys declared it had caught a bush-pig and was eating 
it. The grass was long, and in order to see we got on to 
our men's shoulders, gun in hand. We looked in the 
direction of the noise, but at first could see nothing. 
Looking intently we saw a man spring up in a wriggly 
fashion and then disappear. " Look," said our men, " that 
is a lion-man and he has just changed back into human 
form." We shouted, and rushed over, and going round in 
concentric circles we sought and sought, but could find no 
man nor the trace of a man or lion either. 

Had I been alone I should have said my eyes had de- 
ceived me, but there being two of us, Mr. L and myself, 



Secret Societies & Guilds 117 

our eyes certainly did not deceive us. Doubtless it was a 
native who for some reason or other refused to come to us 
when we called him, and hid himself, but from the purely 
native point of view it was certainly a man changing back 
from lion into human form who was caught in the very 
act. These lion doctors referred to have a powerful guild 
and are well known and greatly feared, being mostly big 
chiefs. The non-man-eating lion is looked on as a rein- 
carnation of a slave, and when a man meets one he falls on 
his face before it and calls out, " Oh, slave. Oh, slave." 
Many a native I have known to lose his life as a result of 
this foolish belief and action, when his spear or gun might 
have saved him. 

The Wemba believe that their chiefs are reincarnated 
often in the shape of lions and prey on their people from 
time to time. Such a lion is called a Chisanguka. 



CHAPTER XI 



Native Enterprise <§f Industry 

NATIVE industry and enterprise prove that trie 
Bantus of Bantuland are neither thriftless nor 
lazy, and use the time, talent, and material at 
their disposal to both profit and advantage. In the 
Katanga the Sanga and Yeke tribes who lived in the 
vicinity of the copper-fields made good use of their oppor- 
tunities and worked the copper into various articles of trade, 
with the result that copper in the form of beads, wire, 
rods, moulds of the shape of a Maltese cross and the letter 
H, became a regular form of currency for hundreds of miles 
E., W., N., and S. along the trade routes. The copper was 
dug out of places where rich deposits lay, and carried in 
baskets to their small smelting furnaces that had been 
erected of clay modelled in beehive shape. The copper 
was built up on the top of a layer of firewood, with char- 
coal heaped on top of that, and thereafter copper was 
mixed with further large quantities of charcoal until the 
furnace was filled. Then after a lot of ceremonies to 
propitiate the spirits and to ensure success in the work, the 
firewood was lighted at the bottom, and the fire blown 
up by means of skin bellows which were inserted in holes 
round the bottom of the furnace. Holes were also left for 
air, and, as the furnace was usually built on a high spot in 
order to ensure a good steady current, at the end of two days 
the copper was smelted out. 

Opposite the little plugged holes round the bottom of 

n3 



Native Enterprise & Industry 119 

the furnaces were moulds in the sand in the shape of 
Maltese crosses and of the letter H. The plug being 
removed from the hole in front of the mould, the molten 
copper was run in until the mould was full, when the hole 
was replugged, and the operation repeated as each casting 
cooled sufficiently to be removed. Some of the copper 
was sold in blocks, but most of it was used to make hoes and 
spears, beads, and wire of a dozen different gauges. The 
finer wire was worked into bracelets and anklets, being 
strengthened with hair from the tails and manes of the 
zebra, and when these did not suffice they were mixed 
with fibre. These bracelets, called Nsambo, were sold for 
two yards of calico per hundred, and the copper crosses, 
weighing approximately i|- lbs. each, were sold at one 
yard of calico each. The hoes used to be hardened for 
hoeing purposes and would wear out to the tang, but the 
secret process of hardening the copper died, I believe, 
with the family who possessed it. Copper spears, axes, 
and knives were used only for ornament. I have sat for 
hours watching them dig and smelt the copper, and work 
it and draw it into wire of many different gauges, some of 
it fine as hair. Copper was also used for making decora- 
tions for spears, guns, and powder horns, fly switches, 
stools, bark boxes, and idols, and the Fundis were quite 
adept at it. They also used it for repairing broken leather, 
horn, and woodwork. While drawing out the copper they 
always sang, as they did with all their work. 

In the Luba country, in the Congo, and in Rhodesia, 
iron digging, smelting, and smithing was one of the useful 
trades that brought great benefit to the neighbouring 
countries and enriched the village blacksmiths. Every 
man, woman, boy, and girl required a hoe. Some had 
two and three, hence the demand for this precursor of the 
plough approximated to the actual adult population of the 



120 Native Enterprise &* Industry 

country. Then each man and boy required, besides, an 
axe, spear, knife, and a supply of arrow heads. All these 
increased the value of iron ore, and enhanced the value of 
these primitive sons of Tubal Cain. The process of smelt- 
ing was similar to that used with copper, but instead of the 
molten metal being poured into moulds it was taken out 
from the furnace in blocks after cooling. These were then 
heated by primitive bellows, made of goat or antelope 
skins, in a charcoal fire, and held by green bark tongs and 
hammered into bars by stone sledge-hammers encased in 
skin, on stone anvils. Then these bars were heated white 
and shaped into hoes, axes, knives, and arrow points with 
primitive hammers, and much care and quite a lot of pride 
went in the early days to giving a good finish to each 
article. Of course time was no object. The Bantu proverb, 
" All hurry, no blessing," corresponding to the Italian one, 
" Who goes slowly goes safely," was often quoted by 
timeless blacks to hustling whites, and I never forget an 
old Luban boy of mine who used continually to remind me, 
" God made some of us to go slow, sir." 

There is certainly no comparison between the trader's 
hoe, axe, and knife sold in stores of to-day and these shapely, 
well-finished articles of the Bantu blacksmith's craft. 

As in copper and iron, the Africans are certainly not 
bad workers in wood. I have seen them shape butts for 
guns into which the locks were carefully fitted. Much of 
the carved work in wood — idols, stools, spear handles, 
canoe paddles, with human heads carved at the end of axe 
and knife handles, or animal and bird heads — do them much 
credit considering the primitive tools they use and the 
inartistic environment in which they live. When natives 
have been instructed they make fair carpenters and even 
cabinet-makers. A number of men work in ivory, and one 
comes across all sorts of things carved out of elephant. 




A Con on Spinner. 

The thread is woevn into shawls. 

Harvest Song and Dance, Katanga. 
This is performed by women bearing hoes in their hands. 



Native Enterprise Industry 121 

hippo, and pig tusks. Finger rings, bracelets, war horns, 
whistles, and well-finished handles for hunting knives are 
among the productions of the ivory carver's art. I have 
seen them carve crocodiles, fish, and animals from tusks of 
ivory, plus serviette rings, vases, etc. I have met a number 
of native gold and silversmiths, but these have mostly 
learnt at the coast from Arabs, Indians, or Europeans. A 
few months ago a native goldsmith from the French Congo 
asked me for a sovereign and a claw to make a lion claw 
brooch. He drew me a smart sketch of the design on 
paper, and after getting the material he disappeared. I 
have never seen him since. Natives — particularly in towns 
— are adepts at this part of the business as well as at the 
other, and past masters in obliterating all trace of their 
whereabouts when they retire. Many natives were good 
workers in horn and leather. They never used horn for 
drinking purposes as we did in Europe, but they make 
beautifully decorated powder horns. They also make 
leather belts and engrave them in pretty patterns, also 
leather pouches for carrying flints, bullets, and fire sticks. 
Not infrequently a man would have two or three leather 
pouches attached to his belt. Horns are much used as 
fetish and medicine holders, and for purposes of cupping, 
and often these are carved in pretty patterns. Long ago 
when we ran out of shoes the natives borrowed old pairs, 
ripped them open, and using them as models, made us 
serviceable shoes from brayed antelope skins lined with 
blue calico. These were comfortable, and would wear for 
three months in constant use. They resembled Boer 
veldschoen. Native blacksmiths have learnt and know 
every part of a gun, and I have seen them repair broken 
parts and fashion out at the forge new pieces that would 
do credit to a European workman. The Arabs always 
travelled with a number of these handy bush armourers to 



122 Native Enterprise & Industry 

repair their guns, and when a war was on, the first men 
requisitioned, who got busy with old guns that had been 
set aside in peace times, were these Fundis. Cotton used 
to be more freely cultivated in the interior than to-day. 
Long ago it was a common sight to see old men and 
women, and young ones too, spinning cotton at their hut 
doors or under trees during moments of leisure from other 
duties. When the cotton, spun into threads, reached a 
certain number of balls, then some dexterous son-in-law, or 
failing him, the village weaver, would be employed to weave 
one or two matonge or strong cotton shawls of two or three- 
coloured patterns, for which he would be paid in chickens 
or other local currency. These homespun shawls are diffi- 
cult to obtain to-day owing to cheap calicoes and print 
cloths brought in by European traders. They were, how- 
ever, superior, certainly more comfortable, and wore longer 
than most of the textile material procurable to-day from 
the stocks of what is called " Kaffir truck." This is another 
of the many moribund African arts. Natives are expert 
taxidermists. Few who have travelled on the Cape to 
Cairo railway through Bechuanaland have failed to be 
struck with the beautiful carosses (skin rugs) made of brayed 
buck, monkey, cat, lemur, or skin of the silver jackal, and 
most travellers buy one or more in passing through. On 
Lake Bangweulu the Batwa and Baunga make a trade of 
brayed and decorated black and red Lechwe antelope skins. 
Patterns are worked on the inside by means of sharp knives, 
and are decidedly pretty. The native women wear the fur 
side of the skin next the body, the prettily worked and 
intricate patterns showing outside. The women are the 
potters of Bantuland. They dig the clay, puddle it, mix 
it with powdered potsherds, and work it into a fine mould- 
able mass. They then take a chunk and work it slowly into 
shape with the hands. Then they put it over a pot of the 



Native Enterprise Industry 123 

kind and pattern required and mould away at it with the 
fingers, a corn husk, and a small shell. They work it round 
and round, as they do not use a wheel, and when the 
outside is well shaped it is left to dry a bit, after which the 
bottom is made and worked on to the body of the pot or 
the water jar. When the pot or jar is shaped they work 
patterns of various kinds round the top and outside on the 
soft clay. They take great pride in their patterns, and the 
little girls, who are all keen to learn it, sit by, look on, and 
watch their mothers at work. Potters get a good price for 
their pottery. They bake their pots in a simple outside 
oven, wrapping them all round with firewood and watch- 
ing the fire closely. 

Every native furnishes his house with a bedstead, the 
pillars of which are sometimes carved with great care, then 
he requires stools, a fireplace, shelf above to keep fish or 
meat or other food, besides hanging nets for various sized 
pots and water jars, and a well-made reed or bamboo door. 
He also cuts out of solid blocks of wood a mortar and 
pestle for pounding meal, and gets an upper and nether 
millstone to grind the small grain. Of course each negro 
builds his own hut according to the tribal shape and 
system in vogue, for no man may change the clan custom 
of house building. Most natives use carved wooden 
pillows or small blocks of wood as head rests. These are 
carved to suit the shape of the neck for comfort. There 
are many native tailors scattered among the rising townlets 
of Central Africa who have learnt the trade since the 
advent of Europeans. Apart, however, from these, and 
long prior to the coming of Europeans, the Luba people 
made hats, coats, and trousers of woven straw. I have 
seen Europeans in the bush wearing these hats and trousers 
and they certainly do credit to the Baluba inventors. 
Even in pre-European days they built out their towns in 



124 Native Enterprise &* Industry 

lines of long streets (mikensa). This Luban system has' 
crept into parts of N.E. Rhodesia, and is certainly an 
improvement on the higgledy-piggledy native village. The 
Luban system of sanitation (earth closets) is also a vast 
improvement on what we find in Angola and Rhodesia, 
where the outside of the entrances and exits to villages are,: 
as a rule, absolutely repulsive. 

Mat-weaving from reeds, papyrus grass, and bamboo is 
one of the most important native industries. A mat is a 
native bed and chair, and no native travels without his 
mat, on which he sits during the day and sleeps at night. 
These are made in many patterns, and sometimes several 
colours are used. The large Arab floor mats and coloured 
" prayer mats " I do not include in the above category. 
Baskets of various kinds are made with and without lids. 
Long bamboo hampers are made for. carrying pots and 
dried fish, and many Europeans use them as pot-baskets 
and food boxes on safari. 

Canoe digging is an occupation that requires experts. 
Very few natives can dig out and shape a canoe that will lie 
well on the water and sail easily. The first thing is to seek 
out a good shapely tree of a wood that does not quickly 
rot. This is cut down, dug out, and shaped inside and on 
the exterior. Bow and stern and gunwale are shaped 
carefully, after which it lies drying for a time. When it 
has been reduced to its final thickness and shape a fire is 
lit, water put inside, and the boat is steamed to make it 
pliable, then it is stretched between the gunwales to open 
it out. Sticks are then fixed between these to keep it in 
place until the canoe is seasoned and assumes its final form. 
Paddles are then made and shaped, and one day the village 
turns out in gala dress to help to launch their monoxyle. 
Many songs are sung in praise of the boat, and of the expert 
boat-builders, and as it enters the water it is, if large, given 



Native Enterprise & Industry 125 

1 special name. Some canoes are small and intended for 
:he owner only, whereas there are canoes I have travelled 
n that held a hundred men. Bark canoes are made some- 
:imes by hunters to enable them to follow elephant or big 
>ame on the other side of a deep river. I remember once 
vhen out hunting we made a bark canoe in two hours and 
aunched it. It was used at that ferry for two years after- 
wards. I had shot a waterbuck which died on the opposite 
Dank, and it was for that we made the canoe. A big tree 
vas chosen, ringed a foot from the bottom and twelve 
feet above ; the bark was then removed by means of a cut 
.ongitudinally ; the bark cylinder was then laid on the 
ground, cut upwards, then a fire was lit at each end. The 
mds were bent in and laced up with bark-rope, then after 
steaming they were bent upwards, making the bows almost 
evel with the gunwale, which was made by lacing a split 
bamboo outside and inside. The holes were bored by 
neans of the pointed end of a spear, then laced. 

Natives love stock and take great interest in poultry, 
>oats, sheep, and cattle. They know the value of these, 
ind will not sell save under the compulsion of necessity. 
They make neat dovecotes for pigeons, chicken houses, 
^oat pens, and cattle kraals. As a rule the foundation horn 
)r post of these buildings must be laid by a woman who has 
)orne twins, the idea being fertility. Salt and tobacco are 
wo of the great industries of Bantuland. From Catum- 
)erla River at Lobito Bay to the Lualaba River in the 
Katanga, the only salt obtainable is got from the coast, 
lence salt is a valuable commodity and article of com- 
nerce. With salt one can buy any kind of native produce. 
Dften when the youngsters came to our camps they were 
dghly pleased, and their mothers too, when we rubbed a 
)inch of salt on the end of their tongue. At the Lualaba 
he salt is got by cutting the grass and burning it, taking 



126 Native Enterprise & Industry 

the ashes and putting them into earth filters through, 
which water is passed. Then the salt water is boiled 
until the water evaporates, when the pot is broken, leaving 
a round block of salt intact. On the Lufira River one 
finds the famous Mwashia salt pans, which contain pure 
white salt. This is gathered with shells and piled intoj 
heaps, then made into blocks of about 7 to 10 lbs., and 
these used to be sold at one yard of calico (value 6d.) 
per block. 

Instances of native enterprise are not uncommon. At 
North Bangweulu a Wemba chief named Fyani Fyani oncei 
introduced Lechwe antelopes on the Luena River, where 
there were none previously, and he also had live fish 
carried in immense pots of water and let loose on that 
same river, where to-day fish abound. Kazembe's Lubao 
canal is another instance of native enterprise. A large 
gang of Luban slaves were used to cut a canal from the 
Luapula River through the great swamps to his head 
village at Mwansavombwe. This canal still exists and Ij. 
have travelled up and down it many times. The Mulenga 
salt pans are about thirty miles east of Mwashia, and the 
salt there is in crystals but of a good quality. Going 
through those salt fields when a wind is blowing is like 
getting a breeze from the briny, and one has often stood 
with distended nostrils sniffing the imaginary ozone, and 
imagining oneself at the seaside. On the east side of 
Bangweulu there are other salt fields, and round Lake 
Mweru on the Rhodesian side. The salt there obtained by 
burning certain grasses and reeds is a potash salt, and not 
at all usable by Europeans. Natives always speak of any- 
thing being " as sweet as salt," and sing a little song, 



" Meat is sweet 
With salt to eat." 



Native Enterprise &? Industry 127 

Tobacco was formerly used by native travellers as the 
American Indians in Fenimore Cooper's stories used it. 
: I have seen my men smoke again and again to stave off 
hunger when food was scarce. Bihean traders, who only 
: eat once a day, smoke continually. When a man is hungry 
and cannot get any food he will beg for " a bit of tobacco." 
The natives cultivate the " weed " largely, and some 
districts having suitable soil are famous for tobacco, and 
seem to get large crops. There is one such district near 
to the Luapula called " Mulangadi." Tobacco is used 
in three ways — chewing, smoking, and snuffing. Swahili 
natives chew it, and I fancy they learnt the habit from 
sailors round the coast. Natives smoke tobacco in various 
; kinds of pipes, but most prefer " the hubble-bubble," a 
1 gourd with water in the bowl, on account of the cooling 
: effect of the smoke passing through the water. Very many 
: natives nowadays indulge in snuff, and use it in enormous 
1 quantities, applying it to the nose with a small shovel-like 
spoon. On Lake Bangweulu some put the snuff on a piece 
of otter skin and rub it over the nostrils. The sneeze is 
a great thing and supposed to be a sign of exuberant health. 
Tobacco as smoke or snuff used to be taboo in the time of 
: Msidi at Bunkeya. This is also a great article of commerce 
I md is sold in large plaited rolls, or in blocks. The latter 
I is strong, but the former is mild, and is much used even by 
:obacco companies in the manufacture of cigarettes. 
: i"iemp, or bhang, is forbidden by most European govern- 
ments, but is still cultivated surreptitiously and sold and 
: imoked in secret. Salt and tobacco form an important 
. i tern in the rationing of the twenty thousand boys employed 
imong the Katanga copper mines and works. 

f 



CHAPTER XII 
Food &> Drink 

IF there is a man anywhere who eats to live^ as the China- 
man is reputed to do, he is certainly not to be found 
among the Bantu peoples of Africa. The verb 
to live, with its many derivatives, is the verb to eat, in 
almost all Bantu languages, expressing life, and existence 
in every form. " Are you well ? " and " How do you do ? " 
in Wemba and other languages means, literally, " Have 
you eaten well ? " A native does not say simply " I'm 
hungry," but " I'm dying with hunger," and he never eats 
satisfactorily if he is not " full up " or, as they say, " tied 
up tight." Their views are like those of the little boy 
who did not appreciate the Christmas party he was taken 
to, " because he did not have that nice sick feeling," or like 
the other boy after the children's feast who said, " Mother, 
you may lift me, but you mustn't bend me." Whether 
in food or drink, " absolutely fu' " describes the negro 
ideal of living. In fairness, however, one must give thej 
other side, and that is that in case of necessity a native 
can sit tight without food longer and possibly grumble less 
than the average man or woman of European race. The 
native is not only a " piggywig " in the matter of food and 
drink, but he is also a past master in the art of bluff and 
sophistry. He reminds one forcibly of Home Tooke's 
diversions of Purley, where the man on trial for his life 
endeavours to play with words and thereby prove that 
right may be wrong and therefore wrong can be right by §] 
process of reasoning. The right hand in Bantu in most 

128 



Food &* Drink 



129 



instances, if not in all, is called the eating hand, and I 
remember once asking a man to hold out his right hand 
when to my surprise out shot his left. I said, " No, that's 
not your right hand," to which he promptly replied, " Yes, 
sir, that is my right hand, for it is the hand I use in eating 
my food." He was what we would call left-handed. The 
meaning we attach to left and right in our language is a 
foreign idea to Africans, for his right hand is always his 
eating hand (mulyo or kulyo) and his left hand is his chi-piko, 
or " awkward hand," and neither of them have any asso- 
ciation with places such as we attribute to them in English. 
He adopts our usage of left and right just as he does brown 
boots and long trousers. When I have killed several head 
of game I have seen my carriers so ill and swollen as the 
result of a meat-eating orgie that, next morning, before 
they could continue their journey each had to roll his 
fellow along the ground and jump up and down on his 
stomach, and then come to me begging for a day's rest in 
camp to get over the effects of their gluttony. Of course, 
to qualify this it would be well to point out that the same 
men had not tasted meat for months previously and 
possibly were suffering from " meat hunger," for which 
they have a particular word — kashia. Every Bantu negro 
is a farmer and responsible for the cultivation of sufficient 
food for the maintenance of himself and his family, 
including the little extras for hospitality and some for 
emergencies. " No fields no food," and as the song says, 
" the only medicine for hunger is hoe medicine," i.e. 
cultivation. This .is the song they continually poke at 
each other when complaints of hunger are made, and 
lazy people fula or sponge on the thrifty : 

" If you're hungry 
Use your hoe, 
The only drug 
The doctors know." 

1 



Food ftp Drink 



Much of the modern education given to the native is 
opportunist and shortsighted. It may be handy and nice 
to have low-paid native clerks, carpenters, builders, and 
other tradesmen, but it would be infinitely better for the 
future of Africa if agricultural officials were sent round the 
villages, vested with Government authority, to insist on 
deeper cultivation instead of merely scratching the surface 
of the soil ; also fertilisation instead of changing to new 
fields every year, and planting only good, fresh seed, 
instead of sowing the same seed in the same fields year by 
year as is done with results detrimental to the crops. 
Well-fenced and more deeply dug fields, better built huts, 
and sanitation laws enforced, better care of children, 
sick and aged, better attention to their own village life 
for the good of all natives and colonists, would result in 
less outcry against natives taking the bread out of the 
mouths of Europeans, and fewer problems would exist 
to perplex statesmen and worry Government officials, 
to whom those vital native questions are all-important. 
The native does not only deal in sarcasm and sophistry, 
but he is a philosopher who carries his philosophy into the 
region of philology, e.g. li is the verb to be, exist ; lia 
is the verb to eat ; lima, the verb to cultivate, and limuka 
means to be shrewd, or wise. Here he argues back that 
to be wise one has to cultivate before one can eat and exist. 
The radical stem li runs through the four verbs. 

The natives have quite a number of grain foods, such as 
mealies, sorghum, millet, birdseed, rice. The maize and 
sorghum are soaked and husked before being pounded intc 
meal in the wooden mortars with pestles. The smaller 
grains are ground with millstones set in a clay setting 
under the verandah near the door of the hut. The mea] 
obtained is used to make the mush, which is the staple bread 
of Bantuland and eaten with one of a number of sauces, 



Food &? Drink 



meat, or fish. This is usually well cooked and is very sus- 
taining. In the Congo, when white flour ran out, a number 
of missionaries and Belgian officials lived on this for many 
months. Root foods include cassava, from which starch 
is made, and a very popular white meal used exclusively 
by some tribes. The root is soaked and sun-dried, pounded, 
and sifted to make meal. There are several kinds of cassava 
root, but one of these is poisonous until soaked for two or 
three days in water to release the hydrocyanic acid contained. 
Cassava leaves make a popular spinach, which, mixed 
with peanuts, is eaten as a sauce (munani=the Scottish 
" kitchen "). The natives call this the all sufficient, and 
say, " We get bread from the root and meat from the 
leaves." This spinach is called facetiously " old man's 
meat," as it requires no chewing. I had a cook who used 
to make a good tapioca from cassava starch, and many 
ladies use it for ordinary laundry purposes. Cassava 
roots are soaked, sun-dried, and stored away like grain for 
future use. Sweet potatoes of many kinds are valued 
very highly, and boiled, or roasted in the ashes, are very 
nutritious. These are sometimes sliced, dried in the sun, 
and preserved for use during the dry season when potatoes 
ire not procurable. Monkey-nuts have great food value 
>n account of the large amount of oil that can be extracted. 
They are roasted, pounded into a paste, mixed and cooked 
vith spinach to flavour them. Peanut butter is made from 
hese, and a very white, good - quality salad oil is also 
btained. Again, a handful of roast peanuts in the pocket 
i equivalent to a few cakes of chocolate when travelling, 
rood cooking oil is also got by first pounding the nut 
oarsely, heating with steam, then pounding, with the 
Idition of half a cup of boiling water to start the oil. 

white ground bean called kalanga, and grown like 
-anuts, is greatly appreciated for its nutritive properties. 



132 



Food &* Drink 



Edible leaves and fruits are found growing wild everywhere. 
One we used for soup, several for salads, and a dozen or 
more were used in the same way as spinaches. A wild 
mint called luena made a good mint sauce for use with 
mutton. There is a small book illustrating some seventy 
different edible leaves to be found throughout the Congo. 
Wild fruits are numerous, and when I built my place on 
Lake Bangweulu there were eleven kinds of wild fruit 
growing on the 200 acres of ground we occupied. On 
account of this I planted three acres of European fruits, 
all of which, save vines, did well. Europeans remove the 
flesh from the fungo plum and put the dried fruit away in 
cans. The juice of a red ground fruit — elephants' favourite 
— preserved and bottled, makes a good, refreshing drink, 
with the addition of a little sugar. In season, elephants and 
monkeys, and even small antelopes feed largely on fruit, 
and one often finds herds of Jumbo feeding in patches of 
bush where wild fruit is plentiful. 

Bread or mush, or mealie pap, as it is called in South 
Africa, is the staple food of every African. A pot of water 
is put on the fire and when it begins to boil a little meal is 
scattered on to the top of the water. When the water 
bubbles and boils thoroughly, the meal is put in handful 
by handful and stirred until the porridge reaches a thick 
mass the consistency of soft bread. It is then removed 
from the pot with the porridge stick and piled up on a 
wooden dish, then patted all round until it assumes a 
circular shape. It is then served as bread, with meat and 
fish, or spinach, and eaten with the fingers. A piece is 
nipped off the size of an egg, a dent or " boat " is made 
with the thumb and this is dipped in the sauce and eaten. 
This process is repeated during the meal, and any left over 
is laid aside and eaten between meals or in the morning. It is 
then toasted on the ashes, or eaten cold, and is called chimbala. 



Food (Sf Drink 133 

Flesh is sometimes stewed, boiled, or roasted on the 
embers and eaten with mush. The natives prefer their 
meat high, and when they can get them they do it up with 
pepper and monkey-nut or palm oil. Fish is cooked in 
various ways. When fresh it is nice grilled on the embers. 
Sometimes it is boiled with peppers or without. Smoked 
and dried fish is usually cooked a long time until a brown 
gravy shows, and of this they are extremely fond. Europeans 
can rarely eat native dried fish. When salt is obtainable 
food is highly seasoned, as the natives like to taste the salt. 
For this reason very few negro cooks are able to season 
food to suit European taste. Sauces are made from various 
edible leaves with the addition of fats or oil, pepper or 
peanuts, when these are obtainable. Fresh-water shrimps, 
and snails, are a great relish to some tribes, as well as 
caterpillars, grubs, snakes, and frogs of ever so many kinds, 
ants, locusts, rats, etc. The man who compared python 
steaks to salmon chops and fat ants and locusts to shrimps 
was certainly a connoisseur in the art of " eating black." 
Still, as natives say, " hunger knows no boundary," and a 
man's idiosyncrasies are often quite unaccountable. 

^ The subject of cooks, cooking, and the kitchen is one of 
vital moment to each Bantu black. Every wife is expected 
to have been trained in the culinary art by her mother and 
at the village school, and to know something about the 
numerous and mysterious dishes that make up the essence 
3f life to her husband and his many club friends. To the 
legro, " to eat is to live," and the married life of a girl 
vho cannot cook will eventually lead to the divorce court, 
>r drive her into the arms of another, who will later on 
>rove equally exacting. A cosy kitchen and a wife who 
as had a good training in boiling, stewing, and roasting 
ats, snails, and grubs of many kinds with occasionally 
ieat and fish, usually proves a happy home, if her tongue 



134 



Food &> Drink 



is not too long. Some housewives are dirty and slovenly, 
while others keep every calabash, pot, and dish in its place, 
and spotlessly clean. Native cooks are an important 
item in the African household of officials, missionaries, 
traders, and travellers, and some of these produce remark- 
able dishes from local produce, prepared and often served 
up under circumstances which it is better the master should 
know nothing about. " Lice and loast beef, sir, with fly 
pudding " (rice and roast beef and fried pudding) replied 
a sable cook boy on being interrogated as to dinner, a 
guest being present. An official I know sent his boy to 
the local market in a certain cannibal country to buy meat. 
After dinner, upon enquiry, my friend found out to his 
horror that he had been eating " black beef " — nyama ya 
muntu. Many instances of this kind occurred in the early 
days of Congo pioneering. Chipinka, a Bihe lad, was my 
first cook, and a paragon of cleanliness. He used to spend 
so much time washing his hands and face that the beans 
got burned and the food was brought to the table uncooked. 
Johnny, an ex-slave boy, whom I rescued from slavery 
many years ago, was certainly one of the best and keenest 
cooks I ever knew. His rule was never to present the same 
dish twice during the week. He could cook and prepare 
the African nkuku, " chicken," in a dozen or more different 
ways. I remember saying to him one day : " Johnny, 
why did you not serve rice with this meat." " It is not 
eaten with rice, sir," was his reply. The slave blood of 
Johnny came to the top, and after many years he became 
one of the most incorrigible rascals I ever knew, and I 
had to send him away for his deceit, stealing, and defrauding 
the natives around my place. The last I heard of him was 
that he had married a Mashukulumbwe woman, and is now 
a big chief in that turbulent cattle country. " Always 
treat your cook as you would your mother," is the African 



Food & Drink 



135 



rule, for he has your life in his hands. I knew a cook 
who was treated harshly by his master — " Too much 
shikote" he said. He therefore decided to poison his boss, 
and procured the poison from a local witch doctor. One 
evening separate dishes were being served up at the officers' 
mess, and this black beauty poisoned his master's dish. 

The officers dispersed, and Capt. Van den B went 

to his room feeling unwell. In a few minutes he was rolling 
on the ground with excruciating internal pain. Luckily, 
at the same moment, a black sergeant was walking past 
the huts where the officers' native servants lived, and heard 
a noise in the cook's dwelling. The cook was dancing and 
singing and shouting loudly : " Master will be dead 
to-morrow, and I shall get no more shikote" The sergeant 
thereupon suspected something and, bursting into the 
hut, seized the boy by the shoulders and ran him up to the 
Chef de Poste. Meanwhile, the latter was writhing in 
pain on the ground, and on the sergeant's story being told 
an emetic was administered at once, and the life of Capt. 
V. d. B. was luckily saved. The cook was tried by court 
martial, sentenced to death, and shot at the native market 
the following Sunday morning. I visited the cook the day 
before execution and he confessed frankly what he had done, 
and why. 

Natives eat only one solid meal a day under ordinary 
circumstances, and few native women would consent to 
cook oftener. This used to be the Medo-Persic law of 
the Bantus, but civilisation has swept this law into the 
waste-paper basket of the past, and, in towns, a native likes 
his three meals per diem the same as his Bwana. Of course, 
he would indulge in snacks in the form of a chunk of roast 
cassava, or potato, or a handful of peanuts between one 
evening's supper and the next. Again, he would indulge 
in a pull at the gourd pipe, or a pinch of snuff. . 



136 Food Drink 

Geophagy, or eating earth, is indulged in by children 
and by pregnant women. The latter say that they eat 
earth only during and after quickening owing to its quieting 
internal effect. 

It is no meaningless alliteration to speak of " the Boozy 
Bantu," whose love of beer can only compare with the 
Scotchman's refuted love of whisky and the Dutchman's 
penchant for gin. Drink beer, think beer, and one might 
add truthfully, stink beer, for a beery nigger can be smelt 
many yards off. Here are the names of ten kinds of beer : 

(1) Maize beer (katata). 

(2) Sorghum beer (bwalzva). 

(3) Millet beer (chimpumu). 

(4) Early millet (mwangwe). 

(5) Red millet {sonkwe). 

(6) Birdseed beer (bwalubedi). 

(7) Palm wine, tapped from oil-palm fronds (malefu). 

(8) Palm wine, tapped from raffia palm (fib ale). 

(9) Honey beer (mbote). 

(10) Unalcoholic beer (munkoyo). 

Grain for beer is soaked in pots, covered, and kept warm 
until it sprouts. It is then sun-dried and ground and the 
beer is made from the malted grain thus ground. Palm 
beers are got by tapping the oil-palm fronds, and the raffia. 
The temperance beer called munkoyo is made from a root 
which tastes like hops and is mixed with meal and made 
in the ordinary way. The strongest of these drinks is the 
palm wine from the raffia, though the other is also strong, 
particularly when left a day or two. Honey beer, too, if 
left, becomes powerfully intoxicating. The weakest beer 
is munkoyo, and is unintoxicating. The favourite means of 
poisoning is to doctor the beer cup of the intended victim. 
More people die in Africa by means of poisoned beer than 



Home Scene in Bantulai^ d 
Malting Grain for Beer. 



Food & Drink 



137 



by anything else. This has given rise to the expression 
" There's bones in the beer," and is one of the strongest 
arguments against beer drinks. When a man becomes 
beery he gets first quarrelsome, and then sleepy, and is 
thus more at the mercy of an enemy, potential or actual. 
More adultery, murders, and wars have sprung from beer 
drinking than from any other cause. " Beer is not mad, 
but mad is he who drinks it," runs the Luban proverb. 
Bzoalzva, " beer," means literally cause of war. Ku-lwa 
means " to fight," and Biva is the prefix signifying cause of. 
Thus Bwalwa, " beer," cause of war, fighting. Kachasa 
is a strong whisky made from beer in two native pots 
joined together by a gun barrel which is inserted in both 
pots, and a gentle fire kept burning underneath. One 
pot is full of beer, and the other empty, and into this the 
alcohol percolates through the gun barrel. I have seen 
officials when cut off from Europe make this and drink it ; 
also European hunters in the bush. The above is the reason 
why native Christian communities will not play at moderate 
drinking of beer, but go in for total prohibition. They know 
better than white people their own weakness, and certainly 
ought to be allowed their own form of legislation in this 
matter. There are gluttons and drunkards, and among 
most tribes are to be found men who boast of their capacity 
to eat and drink more than their fellows. One of my best 
headmen was an awful drunkard and used to go literally mad, 
and it was due to a drunken mad fit caused by beer that he 
was killed by his wife. In my early days I used him as 
interpreter, but he told such lies (like most interpreters) 
that I was compelled to dispense with his services. " Why 
did you tell that chief and his people that I was a fighting 
white man and had guns to carry and kill at an impossible 
distance ? " " Well, sir," with head hanging down, 
" I'm sorry, but if I had told them what you asked me to 



138 Food & Drink 

say they would have despised us and robbed the caravan." 
" Traduttori Tradittori " is an Italian aphorism that 
fits here. 

Kanwa, " mouth," means " the drinker," in the ver- 
nacular, or " he who drinks," from the prefix ka, " he," 
and nwa^ the verb to drink. The native is childlike, and 
is still at the dawn of self-consciousness, the awaking of the 
ego. He does not realise that " this is I." He talks to his 
arm, or leg, or head, or feet, as he does to a bird, or buck, 
or bush. The body is mubili, " the two-divisioned one." 
Two eyes, ears, arms, cheeks, nostrils, legs, etc. 

The head is — " the apex," Mutwi. 

The eyes are — " the gazers," Mense. 

The ears are — " the sharpers," Matwi. 

The nostrils are — " the perceivers," Myona. 

The mouth is — " he who drinks," Kanwa. 

The feet are — " the trampers," Makasa. 

He has been for so many centuries a mere cog in the 
tribal machine, a slave, that the idea of individualism and 
freedom is a thing to be shunned. He is a socialist to the 
bone, a member of a great responsible society called a tribe. 
Natives are extremists, and either eat too much when they 
can get it, drink too much, and dress immoderately, or 
starve and go naked. Our civilisation has been too hurried, 
and caught the negro for the nonce, napping, for here in 
the interior of Bantuland he is still rubbing his eyes, yawn- 
ing, and stretching himself, while muttering like a man in 
a dream : " What is it all about ? " He still has a vague, 
unformulated notion in the back of his head that the white 
man will yet go away and leave him at peace to go his own 
ways and do his own sweet will. He would rather a thou- 
sand times have the old palmy days with their own rule of 
black tyrants, mutilations, and slavery, than all the unsought 
blessings of our — to him — doubtful civilisation. 



CHAPTER XIII 



Native Dress &? Habits 

DECORATION rather than dress seems to have 
been the primeval idea of all primitive peoples. 
To prove this one has only to glance at photos 
of a dozen native tribes on the equator who go absolutely 
naked, or of the South Sea Islanders. The custom of hair- 
dressing, teeth chipping and filing, with tattooing and 
cicatrisation — three important bodily forms of decoration 
in vogue among savage peoples — is much more intricate 
and highly developed among tribes who go absolutely 
naked than among people who have adopted dress of 
various fashions. Among a few tribes who despised, and 
some who yet despise, clothing as effeminate are the 
Konde people of Nyasaland, the Mashukulumbwe of 
Northern Rhodesia, with the Fans, Dinkas, and many other 
equatorial tribes. Other Africans call them " the go- 
nakeds " (Cbenda bwamba). An infinite number and 
variety of hair-dressing styles obtain all over Bantuland, 
including the use of made-up tails and wigs, plus imitative 
hair-dresses representing animal horns, including the 
buffalo horn head-dress worn by the chief Kazembe, which 
is imposing and only worn on state occasions. At such 
official functions he also wears lion manes round his arms, 
and woven bead puttees round the legs, also facial head 
decorations. Native women are very proud and vain in the 
matter of personal appearance, and this is seen perhaps 
more conspicuously in the matter of " coiffure." I have 

i39 



140 Native Dress & Habits 



seen chiefs' wives and big ladies spend five to ten days over 
a " coiffure," and this represented work of at least six or 
more hours a day. It is very noticeable that the nearer one 
approaches to the coast and civilisation the less imposing 
and fewer one finds the styles of head-dressing and decora- 
tion, and the greater tendency there is among men and 
women to adopt European customs in the matter of dress 
and habits. I have made a list of ten different styles of 
head-dressing, including wigs and pleated tails : 

(1) Mapango, " the buffalo horn head-dress worn by the 
chief Kazembe." 

(2) Kapompo, " is a bunch of hair in the shape of a big 
bun worn by the same chief at the back of the head." 

(3) Nkoka, " is the hair pleated from front to back in long 
straight lines." 

(4) Tukamenye, " is a Wemba style of head-dressing, 
fuzzy and bunchy, and plastered with oil and red dye." 

(5) Tusula, " are wigs made out of beaten bark cloth 
soaked in oil and red dye, with holes bored through them, 
through which are passed small strings knotted inside to 
prevent coming out, while the inside of the wig is lined with 
a soft^kin. These are worn also for baldness." 

(6) Misishi ya Nsupa, " is a wig made of a gourd, over 
which wax is laid and pleats of hair stuck round upon the 
stiff wax to resemble a wig." 

(7) JBuyange, " are long pleated tails of hair and other 
material oiled up and powdered and hang down head and 
neck." 

(8) Ndobo, " fish-hook style of head-dressing, and is made 
so that each hook of hair hooks on to the other with hook 
side up and is plastered with castor oil and camwood 
powder." 

(9) Kasbinga, " is a circular style of head-dress made by 
dressing a circle round the outer edge of hair, and working 



Native Dress & Habits 141 



in concentric circles towards the centre. It is stiffened with 
castor oil and red powder." 

(10) Tuminankula, " is the hair pleated, each pleat half 
an inch long and straight. It is tied round with other 
hairs and the ends are singed off even with a small firestick. 
Peanut oil is squirted and poured over from the hair- 
dresser's mouth, after which camwood powder is applied 
for stiffening." 

N.B. — There are other hair-dressing styles in vogue 
among the tribes between Angola and Rhodesia, with wigs, 
tails, chignons, aureoles, etc. The hairdresser is called 
Mulushi wa misishi and Kaluka wa musisbi. 

Neck decorations are popular with women, and take the 
form of brass and copper wire collars. The wire, which is 
softened first by heat, is twisted round the neck by the 
coppersmith, or an expert, into the shape desired. This 
is often regulated by the amount of wire possessed. If the 
woman is wealthy the neck is covered, then the coils are 
continued until the collar lies on the shoulders three inches 
from the neck. Some women wear woven bead collars of 
pretty patterns of many-coloured beads, which — unlike the 
wire collar — may be removed at pleasure and changed for 
other patterns. Some merely wear necklaces of whatever 
kind of bead happens to be in fashion at the time. Traders 
are often left with stocks of unsold beads owing to the 
quickly fluctuating fashions of the black Bantu beauties. 
I knew a European who had boxes of a bead that, as the 
fashion had changed, went out of favour and the beads 
became dead stock in his store. One day he called on the 
queen of the country and gave her a bunch of these out-of- 
fashion beads with a present for her trouble in wearing 
them. In a few days the beads came back into fashion 
again, and my friend quickly disposed of his whole stock at 
good prices. 



142 Native Dress &* Habits 



Arms and legs also receive a certain amount of attention 
long before the waist is attended to or the laws of decorum 
fulfilled by these sable sons and daughters of Eden. Ear 
and nose sticks and rings of beads, metal, or ivory are used, 
while by some a heavy disc is inserted to distend the lips 
and gives that duckbill-like appearance adopted by the 
women of certain tribes. I was told that the women did 
this to make themselves ugly in the sight of the Arab slave- 
traders, who preferred pretty women, as they brought better 
prices. Finger rings of metal and ivory are worn. Bracelets 
of brass, copper, and iron, strengthened with zebra hair or 
fibre, are also much worn, and women are to be found with 
four hundred to five hundred of these round their arms or 
legs at one time. Some like heavy ornaments, as it gives 
them a slow walk and stately appearance. Armlets of brass 
and copper five-sixteenths of an inch thick are twisted 
round the wrist, and wound up the forearm spirally, almost 
to the elbow. These are much coveted by women, and 
though heavy and awkward are worn daily for years. Some 
women also decorate the upper part of the arm in a similar 
manner. The lower extremities are treated in the same way 
as the upper, and often the weight of brass and copper wire 
round the legs is enormous. This tends to a slow, stately walk 
which, among the natives, is considered a mark of superior 
birth and breeding. Muntu wa mutende is a slow person, 
and is also a person of a gentle, superior type. The hustling, 
hurrying European from a native point of view is con- 
sidered a low-type person, for speed and hustle is looked on 
as the special mark of slave blood. I have seen some women 
wear toe rings, but these are not at all common. 

Next and last come body and trunk decorations. This 
is the last step in decoration and ornament, and usually 
from this the first step towards dress begins. At first, 
women usually wear a girdle of beads round the waist, and 



Native Dress & Habits 143 



when dress fashion develops and clothing comes into vogue 
the girdle becomes the central and permanent part of a 
woman's wardrobe. When a married woman dies, her 
sister who takes her place as inherited wife is said " to 
inherit the belt." Men wear as a rule a rough leather 
waistbelt long before they think of covering their naked- 
ness. Hunters wear rings of ivory on arms and legs for 
each elephant or buffalo killed ; but generally speaking the 
only bodily decorations worn by men are fetish ornaments 
of various kinds attached to arm, leg, neck, or waist by a 
string or thong. 

Now we come to the question of tattooing and cicatrisa- 
tion, practised all over Bantu Africa. Each of these marks 
or designs branded on the body has, as a rule, some special 
secret significance. It is also a sure sign of tribal origin and 
a means of identity. It has a tendency to promote union 
among all with similar markings, because in every instance 
they must belong to the same tribe. Again, it binds a man 
to his tribe for life, because if he should run away and join 
an enemy tribe his tribal marks would betray him, and prob- 
ably sooner or later cost him his life. This custom Hero- 
dotus describes as one of the characteristic features of the 
Thracians and Scythians, and to this may possibly be 
traced the origin of heraldry. Absurd as it may seem the 
conventional emblems in use at the present day, and the 
devices which are used on note-paper and carriage panels, 
owe their distant origin to the indelible tribal marks which 
were cut and punctured on the skin of our early ancestors. 
In cicatrisation the skin is sometimes pulled up by a pair 
of crude forceps, and then cut with a native razor, as is 
seen very uniquely on the Bangala and Basoko people of the 
equator. The cicatrices raised are more like scars, blackened 
and rendered permanent by the rubbing in of charcoal, 
mixed with burnt libamba grass. The Wemba tattoo 



144 Native Dress & Habits 



tribal marks consist in a vertical line down the middle of 
the forehead which ends between the eyebrows, and is 
called mutoso, and a crossbar on either side of the face called 
mimbuli. There is also a vertical marking from the nape 
of the neck half-way down the spine, which is the most 
common. The arms of a Wemba hunter are usually 
tattooed to indicate the number of elephants or big game 
he has failed to kill, for these tattoo marks all represent the 
elephant medicine rubbed in to give him success, and not 
the number of animals killed, i.e. each time he fails he has 
to have recourse to fresh medicine and have them tattooed 
in. Boys and girls are usually tattooed about the age of 
puberty, seldom before. The women are tattooed elabor- 
ately over the abdomen, and I am told that these are merely 
meant for beauty and appearance. These tattoos are called 
Nsangzva, and the principal one, which extends to the 
umbilical cord, is called Mukomango. The Yeke tribes of 
Katanga tattoo on each side, over the abdomen, four rows 
of tattoo marks, called " fishbones," which they resemble. 
They also make similar markings on each side from each 
breast to the shoulder. All men, women, grown-up boys 
and girls are thus tattooed. Each tribe has its special 
tattoo markings, the details of which are so elaborate and 
meticulous that for a full description, with drawings and 
explanation of their significance, not one but several very 
large books would be required. 

Filumba, or " tribal pride of ancestry," is the only answer 
I can get as to the reason for tattooing. The original 
meaning of the pattern tattooed lies buried, like much else in 
Bantuland, under the accretion of centuries. These Bantu 
peoples are worthy of interest, because of their being the only 
existing modern witnesses of primitive humanity as it existed 
thousands of years ago, after it had extricated itself from 
the swaddling clothes of pure animality. In these Bantu 



Native Dress & Habits 145 



peoples there remains the only hope, ere civilisation floods 
the earth, of finding out the secrets of life lived by the 
world's earliest inhabitants. Here is a field where one may 
expect at any time the re-discovery and re-emergence of 
a lost world. 

Dental decoration is another of the primitive customs 
which pervaded Africa, and one that is perhaps more 
wrapped up in mystery than either hair-dressing or tribal 
tattooing. Teeth to the savage are what the knife and the 
mincing machine are to a civilised man and woman. Life 
and death depend on dentition, according to tribal law, 
to break which brings misery, disaster, and ill-luck to all 
concerned (see Chapter XVI). Radiating from the baby's 
first tooth are dental customs which are both numerous 
and curious. Most fishing tribes, or " water children " as 
they call themselves, chip and grind their teeth in imitation 
of fish, which disproves the old dental theory that once 
the enamel is destroyed the teeth decay. Wemba, Twa, 
Unga, Shila, Luena, and many other tribes file their teeth 
thus to sharp points as described, and so do most fishing- folk. 
Some tribes like the Luba, Lunda, and Mambwe knock out 
two, and sometimes four, of their lower incisors. Some 
tribes file the teeth in serrated fashion. The Yeke, Nyam- 
wezi, and Swahili tribes do not practise teeth deformation 
in any form. Mashukulumbwe knock out all the upper 
and lower incisor teeth. The Baila of N. Rhodesia knock 
out the two central lower incisors and file the two upper 
central incisors into an inverted V shape. No special 
dental deformation can be described as the hall-mark of one 
particular tribe, for the matter of teeth decoration is often 
left to the discretion or the individual taste of the man or 
•voman. This may, however, be due to a tendency to tribal 
.lackness owing to more civilised natives poking fun at 
:hem for their " crocodile teeth," etc. I asked a man 

K 



146 Native Dress Habits 



once, " Why do you chip and file your teeth ? " He 
answered thus : " If my teeth were allowed to grow any 
way they would grow out of mouth and eat my ears off." 
The reasons I have heard given in regard to nudity are also 
equally primitive : " Why should we cover our bodies ? 
We have no diseases to hide. We were born naked, and 
why should we dress ? " Also the eternal African answer 
to most questions : " It's our custom handed down from 
our forefathers, and we won't leave it." Dress has its 
inception among primitive peoples in (a) a desire to cover 
the genital organs for comfort and protection, and (b) 
later on a sense of shame (nsoni) which is not, however, 
highly developed among the interior tribes. Men and 
women often bathe openly in the rivers and pools, and 
fishermen, hunters, and blacksmiths often go about their 
work naked to the blast. 

The first stage of dress allowance is very limited, and 
always and everywhere associated with a desire, on the part 
of the women, to cover mere nakedness. Eventually the; 
belt or cord and a two-inch bark rag or strip of skin gives 
place to something bigger, which gradually goes on in- 
creasing until you get the full- dressed and the finished 
(European !) article. In the matter of dress, woman's first 
concern is to pass a strip of fibre, or grass or bark cloth, 
under the armpits to keep the breasts from dangling, for, 
after the birth of the first child, they become extraordinarily 
broad and long. Later on, the size of the band increases 
until, after touch with civilising influences, it becomes a 
full-blown under-garment. A mission lady was once so 
shocked to see women come to her house with uncovered 
breasts that she made a rule that no woman with breasts 
uncovered should ever approach her dwelling. The first 
woman who showed face after this was promptly sent off 
to cover her breasts. She went outside and returned in 



Native Dress Habits 147 



a few minutes with her breasts covered by the small cloth 
that she always wore round her waist, which left her other- 
wise naked. The lady never repeated her rule, and after 
that she allowed the women round her place to make haste 
slowly in the matter of dress. 

The Luena women wear skin aprons of slit skin, four 
inches wide and a few inches long, which are worn in front 
and a strip of skin behind. This is kept in place by a belt. 
The Luba women wear short grass skirts about ten inches 
wide. The Katanga women to-day, with the women of 
the Lunda and Wemba tribes, wear as a rule full dress 
from under the armpits to the feet. These are often 
two yards square. Batwa, Baunga, and Bisa women on 
Bangweulu wear decorated skin shawls of Lechwe, or 
plain ones of Sititunga, antelopes. They also wear sheep 
skins, which, when cleaned and dressed, look decent and 
are certainly more comfortable than trade calico. Men 
wear two cat skins, one in front and one behind, and some- 
times otter skin. Nyasaland women make very pretty 
aprons of woven bead-work, with bead girdles, necklaces, 
bracelets, and other adornments, and are quite expert in 
this though they are very loth to sell the same to admiring 
Europeans. Bark cloth, shawls, and blankets are made 
from the bark stripped from several kinds of trees, prin- 
cipally the Mutaba tree, which is planted as a shade tree 
round villages and also makes a beautiful green avenue. 
We had one such at the Government station at Fort 
jRosebery, N. Rhodesia. They strip a piece of bark a yard 
or more in width, then, after knocking off the outer bark, 
(beat it out with a wooden mallet scored on the face with 
; :riss-cross lines. The bark is thus reduced by hammering, 
rind teased to an equal thickness. These pieces are then 
ewn together until the requisite size is obtained, after 
vhich they are oiled all over and rubbed with red dye, and 



148 Native Dress & Habits 



with fibre thread are sewn and decorated in pretty seams 
and patterns. Several dyes are used which are made from 
berries, roots, and flowers. A red dye is got from the bean 
of the Usishi tree, and the cloth is frequently boiled in 
camwood. A khaki dye is made from the bark of two 
different trees called Mubaba and Namwenshi. The 
Lubans and many Congo tribes are expert in making fibre 
cloth of various kinds, and a strong, useful grass cloth also 
which they weave by hand. These they cut up, and make 
into trousers, coats, hats, and skirts. In fact, Lubans long 
before the arrival of Europeans had actually adopted 
styles of dress and building and other European habits, 
with towns laid out in streets, and up-to-date sanitary 
arrangements were also in operation. Last comes the 
European trader with all his bric-a-brac from Brummagem, 
now summed up under the obnoxious title of " Kaffir 
truck." With cheap calicoes, blankets, clothes, Africa 
is at last emerging from her Eden-like simplicity in the 
matter of dress and habits. Some of the trade calicoes and 
clothes are good, wearable, and quite substantial, while 
there is much that is poor, full of starch, and after the first 
shower of rain leaves the wearer less covered than he was 
with fibre, grass, bark cloth, or skins. Headgear used to 
be worn in the form of skin caps, or head-dresses of various 
kinds decorated with gaudy feathers, or cleverly con- 
structed wigs. To-day the hat, called chafeo (from the 
Portuguese), is worn in the form of straw, broad-brimmed 
felt, policeman's helmet, or the bowler ; or, as at the coast, 
a stovepipe edition. I have seen an old native trader 
coming up from the coast with frock coat and trousers, 
boots over his shoulders, and three silk hats on his apex. 
By Rugarugas and German East African natives the turban 
is used, and out East the red Morocco fez cap is worn, also a 
white embroidered cap is worn by the Swahilisand Zanzibaris. 



Native Dress &? Habits 149 



Footgear used to be worn in the form of skin sandals 
fastened at the toe and round the ankle. These were made 
from zebra, waterbuck, and other big fauna skins, and were 
much worn by native travellers and hunters. To-day 
clogs, and hobnailed, black, and brown boots, and even 
kid, are much in evidence, and worn by a quarter of the 
natives round mining towns. The imitative tendency 
in the Bantu is a potent factor in the transformation of the 
dress and habits of a people who thirty years ago only 
concerned themselves about body decoration as seen in 
the elaborate head-dresses, tattooing, and teeth chipping 
and filing already described. As in their language and 
languages, their government and social system, their laws 
and regulations, their system of building construction, 
and their religion, so in the sartorial art the Bantus are 
quickly copying the fashions of Europe. Their languages 
are dying, their arts and manufactures, industries and 
enterprises, are all in the same moribund condition, so that 
in a few decades the African will be living as artificial a life 
as the modern civilised peoples of Europe. Whether it 
is for better or for worse remains to be seen. Nous verrons ! 



CHAPTER XIV 



Courtship Marriage 

HERE I translate and transcribe the formal 
ceremonies associated with courtship and 
marriage as written out for me some years 
ago by a Wemba man in his own native idiom ; merely a 
simple statement on the subject, and void of decorative 
detail. 

" If a man wants to marry a woman he first of all looks 
out a suitable person himself, or on enquiry hears through 
others of a likely partner. Then he asks if she is unspoken 
for, and if she is free from any taint of disease, acquired or 
inherited. All the villagers where she lives say, 4 No, she 
is clean, gentle, and is a careful and modest person, she has 
no bad manners, and is not long tongued.' Then he sends 
his go-between, saying, 6 Go and ask her if she is willing 
to marry me, and hear what she says.' Then the marriage 
go-between reaches the girl's home and calls for the girl, 
saying, 6 I have a message for you, lady. My companion 
sent me to deliver it. He says, " I love that woman and 
want to marry her " ; this is the message I have come to 
deliver.' Then the girl consents, saying, 6 Whoever refused 
an offer of marriage ? I think two are better than one if 
the two are mutually agreed.' The marriage go-between 
returns and says, 6 Yes, she is agreeable.' In the evening 
he who wants to marry goes on a visit himself. He says 
to the girl, e I want you to be my wife.' The girl answers, 
' Yes, sir. I agree, provided you love me truly.' The man 

150 



Courtship <§f Marriage 151 

replies, 6 Yes, truly, lady, and no lie. I love you.' Then the 
girl agrees, saying, c All right, then, if you love me, but 
remember I do not want to be a polygamous wife, for 
polygamy is not good for a woman.' The man answers, 
6 No, I shall never marry another. I only want to marry 
you.' The girl consents again, saying, e All right, let us 
marry.' Then the man sends his go-between to the mother 
and aunts. The go-between says, e I have been sent with 
this message from my friend to you ladies. He says, " I 
want to marry your daughter." The mother and aunts say, 
6 That's all right, we are quite pleased. The chief thing 
is that they should care for each other, and that he work for 
his wife. Also, he should respect his marriage relations 
and help them and clothe them as becomes a son-in-law.' 
Then the prospective mother-in-law enquires, £ What is 
his clan ? ' Then the go-between replies, 6 He belongs to 
the field rat clan.' Then the go-between takes the message 
back to his friend, saying, c Yes. The mother and aunts 
agree ; it's all right.' Then the prospective son-in-law 
sends a request for tobacco, and the prospective mother- 
in-law sends the tobacco asked for, which is a sign of agree- 
ment. (Native women ask for tobacco when they offer 
themselves to men, and this custom is prevalent all over 
the Katanga and Rhodesia). Then the young man knows 
that they have accepted him to marry their daughter. 
From now on he may begin to court the girl with the 
parents' permission. When the prospective son-in-law 
his finished his courtship he gets together a marriage 
present. He hands it to the go-between, saying, ' Go and 
arrange all the business concerning the marriage.' Then 
the go-between takes the marriage dowry to the prospective 
mother-in-law, saying, c See, we have brought the dowry.' 
The prospective mother-in-law says, 6 All right, sit down, 
>ir.' They say, 6 Let's call the girl that she be present at 



152 Courtship &* Marriage 

the arrangements for her marriage.' Then they call the 
girl, and the mother strikes up a little song : 

' Oh I'm so happy, happy. 
I'm so pleased and happy,' 

and she adds, ' Yes, Mr. Go-between, what I'm saying is 
absolutely true. I like my prospective son-in-law. Go 
straight and tell him that from me.' The go-between 
then asks, 4 Now, what about the marriage-day and arrange- 
ments ? ' The prospective mother-in-law says, ' But the 
things for the wedding feast have not yet been got together. 
We shall sleep and wake over to-morrow, and then the day 
after shall be the wedding-day.' Then the girl's marriage 
relations announce the matter publicly to the whole village. 
When the prospective son-in-law arrives he greets them 
and they give him some beads and a bracelet, and later 
an arrow which is to pierce any seducer of his wife. When 
he is satisfied he returns to the village in the evening and 
says, ' Let them bring me my wife now.' Then on taking 
her away from the mother's house they first give the girl 
a string of beads and a hoe. She is carried on the back of a 
strong woman (her wedding coach) as it is not considered 
dignified for her to walk. She must pretend to be very 
reluctant to leave her mother's roof and her maiden liberties. 
At this point the crowd of women guests present strike up 
a little song, the words of which are : 

6 Oh night- jar, oh little bird, 
Your long, lovely feathers have grown. 
Your time has come, your year of love. 
Oh night- jar, oh little bird.' 

Then the men pay up a girdle of pretty beads to the 
bride's party, on receiving which they strike up the following 

son S ' ' Bring me a hammer, 

To smash the hyena. 



Courtship & Marriage 



153 



Let's break his bones, 
And his wife's bones too. 
She also is a hyena, 
Let's break her bones.' 

Then the women draw near and strike up another little 

song : < The wild cat , s skin dresSj 

They are calling and calling for. 
I'm dragging, dragging her. 
We're bringing her, bringing her.' 

They give the women a belt of beads, and the men sing 
again • < -jyj-y oil-palm tree, 

Does it refuse to bear fruit. 

Oh there's no nuts on it, 

We can't wait all night. (At the door of the house.) 

We're hungry now. 

Oh bring us the fruitful palm tree.' 

The women then knock at the man's door and they sing a 
little song : 

' The crowns have stuck to the spirit stone. 
Oh who shall take them out alone ? ' 

" The men then pay up a hoe, and the bride and bride- 
groom are put to bed and then left alone. (Wedded and 
bedded according to old Scotch custom). In the morning 
the elder women come and fetch them out and instruct 
them in their duties thus : ' Now, my children, know only 
each other, you woman your husband, and you man your 
wife. You are married now. See, man, that you have 
only eyes for your wife and don't be all eyes for other 
women.' Then the elder women rise and strike up another 
ittle song, thus : 

* A young bride is proud, is proud, 
And on the marriage bed she's proud. 
We dance at your wedding, little bride, 
Though we don't know the man you've married.' 



154 Courtship <§f Marriage 

Further instructions are given by one and another, thus : 
' In a house there can't be two lions. See to it, girl, that 
you listen to and obey your husband in all things and be a 
good wife.' Then the official marriage is over and the guests 
all scatter. When the marriage company has gone the 
mother-in-law brings food to the bride and bridegroom, 
singing a little song : 

' Ding-dong, we bring good food. 
Nothing pleases the bridegroom. 
The feast is spread, he's got no eyes — • 
No eyes or thought save for his bride.' 

They put the food down at the house and the bridegroom 
calls the go-between and the principal elders to come and 
share the feast. Returning the empty dishes the men 
put a new hoe and dress or nice cloths into them — a present 
for the women-folk. The bridegroom pays the go-between 
his fees, after which the marriage is over and the cere- 
monies are ended." 

The basis and starting-point of all society upon which 
depends the family, the clan, the tribe, and the individual, 
is found in the bi-sexual couple, man and wife. In Rhodesia 
and a great part of the Katanga the courtship and marriage 
customs are much alike, so that one may generalise and yet 
be true to type. Boys' and girls' rites, e.g. circumcision 
and puberty ceremonies, are more or less considered as 
leading up to marriage and the consequent tribal con- 
tinuity, and hence are not out of place here. Circum- 
cision for boys, though practised by the Luba, Lunda, 
and Luena tribes, is not in vogue throughout Southern 
Katanga or Northern Rhodesia. There are a number of 
secret societies where boys are initiated and learn much 
regarding their future duties, but the main lessons taught 
by natives at puberty are reserved for the girls. When a 
young girl discovers that she has attained puberty, she 



Courtship &> Marriage 155 



runs into the forest and hides herself until, as a rule, she is 
discovered by some one, who rushes back to the village, 
saying, " I have discovered a Chisungu girl." She is then 
sought for by the elder women who have to do with the 
Chisungu or puberty ceremonies, and after ceremonial 
purification is brought back in the evening to her hut in 
the village. When the usual period of a few days have 
elapsed she is allowed to do odd jobs about the house. 
During the initiation period, which lasts for at least a 
month, the girl may not leave her hut save in the company 
of elder women. Drumming and singing and general 

; rejoicing is kept up during the initiation month and no 
male is allowed to enter the initiation hut where the girl 
is confined save a shimpundu, or father of twins. (In lay- 
ing the foundations of pigeon houses, chicken houses or 

I goat pens, or anything for breeding purposes a similar 
favourable concession is made to either a father or a mother 
of twin children. It is supposed to have a beneficial or 
prolific effect. There is a native woman I know who has had 
twins three times, and she is in great demand for laying the 
foundations of pigeon and chicken houses, goat and sheep 
pens, and even a cattle kraal.) At these puberty ceremonies 
the girls are instructed in the ordinary facts and duties of 
life, and they are very roughly handled by these primitive 
teachers of savage life and morals. They are made to do 
ill sorts of absurd things to prove that they are fit to enter 
:he society of grown-ups. Sometimes a basket of tiny 
)ird-seed grain is poured out on the ground, and they are 
nade to pick it up, replacing every grain, and during the 
process songs inculcating thrift and the value of food are 
tinned into their ears. The girl is taken by the women 
lders inside a hut called Mbusa and shown all sorts of 
veird things, which are pointed out and explained to her 
d that she shall not enter this new state of life " in blissful 



156 Courtship & Marriage 

ignorance." She has to pass through many other rite; 
and ceremonies which are supposed to prepare her for hei 
future life as a wife and mother, and at the conclusior 
of this puberty initiation she is considered as grown up 
and marriageable. 

Sometimes the girl is matched and sometimes marriec 
before puberty, when a ceremony constituting marriage 
is gone through with much solemnity and ceremonial 
just as in the case of an ordinary hwinga, or marriage 
ceremony. Under these circumstances I have heard a man 
proudly say of his wife, " Did we not grow up together i 
Did I not see her through her puberty ceremonies ? Are 
we not just twin children ? " I have seen some happy native 
couples who have married very young and gone through 
life together until death parted them. In polygamy sucr 
a woman usually becomes the head wife. Though the 
Chisungu wife has high status, the real ceremonial wife ii 
the Ina bzvinga, or " married mother," as she is called 
for whom all the sacred tribal marriage rites were solemnisec 
in the presence of the spirits living and dead. She is the 
real mukolo, or head wife, who gets all the praise in song, 
and presents in kind. She and only she knows her lord anc 
master, his strength and weakness. Then there is the com- 
mercially acquired wife, a free woman and the eligible 
daughter of some local somebody, who if virtue and beaut) 
count for anything may eventually oust her predecessors, 
and get the coveted headwife's place. Fourthly, there 
used to be the slave wife, who had merely a marketable 
value, and who could, with her children, be sold to pay a 
debt or to fill the family purse. These slave wives were 
often exchanged or sold. 

The system of wife inheritance is one that involves 
many complications and much trouble. For example, if a 
man loses his wife by death he sends a messenger with a 



Courtship & Marriage 157 

big present representing what is called " the death dues," 
or rather, part thereof, for the first " death payment " 
is a mere instalment to notify, and many an unfortunate 
widower has been ruined in an endeavour to satisfy the 
greed, and appease the sham wrath, of his dead wife's 
relatives. If the notification parcel (representing the black- 
■ edged card) is too small, the relations send it back, saying, 
" Our sister cannot be dead, or a suitable announcement 
. would have reached us." Therefore, to notify a dead wife's 
. relations, if numerous, is a serious and expensive prelim- 
inary. Again, the malilo, or " wake," may not commence 

• until the dead woman's nearest relatives arrive, hence the 
:: delay due to haggling over the preliminary notification. 
I Then before they can bring a sister to take the dead woman's 
I place with the husband the man has to pay and pay, and to 
tget together enough he has to borrow, and often he is left 
:;with debts that will keep him down for years to come. 
I If the nearest sister is married then the next is called, and if 

she is too young, as in a case I knew years ago, they have 
to provide a slave woman or hire a woman to take the place 
until the young sister is grown up. If there are no unmarried 
I sisters then a married sister must spend a night or more 

• with the widower " to take the death away from his body." 
.This may, and does often, lead to trouble and even divorce. 
|i Divorce may be sought and obtained for a number of 

easons, barrenness being the most common. I have 
mown a husband and wife accusing each other and bickering 
>ver no children until the woman appealed to be given as a 
emporary wife to a man who had already a large family. 
This was done, and the woman gave birth to a healthy baby 
oy. The man was jeered at as the cause, and, strange to 
iy, he married a widow with a family of three, by whom 
e also had several children. 

Incompatibility of temper is one of the causes of frequent 



158 Courtship Marriage 

divorce, and I have known a woman who, to get rid of a 
man she disliked, plagued his life and pursued him like a 
fury from day to day. She eventually tore his clothing 
from his body and acted in a nameless way such as is common 
in Central Africa. Frequent adultery is often a common 
cause of divorce, though ordinarily this crime can be 
settled by a money payment to the injured husband. Some- 
times the man kills the woman, and sometimes kills the 
guilty pair. I knew a man at Johnston Falls, where I lived, 
whose wife had gone repeatedly after other men. He 
followed his wife to the field one day, killed her there, 
and cut her into pieces. He fled, but was followed by 
the woman's brother, who killed him in a thicket. 

Jealousy causes endless trouble, and often leads to 
separation and to divorce after long years of a happily 
married life. Sometimes a headwife will threaten a husband 
with desertion unless he puts away So-and-so — some young 
wife of whom she is jealous — and often the man obeys, 
as he cannot afford to part with the wife of his youth and 
all the associations, though he can easily obtain another 
young wife to fill the place of the inferior woman. Some- 
times the husband fails to clothe and provide for his wife, 
and his mother-in-law, and to help in the gardens, and the 
mother-in-law, after frequently warning the son-in-law, 
takes the girl away, restores the dowry paid, and marries 
her daughter to a wealthier or more industrious suitor. 
This was not easily done in the old days, but now the 
transition to European law has brought about a laxity of 
application in the more stern and rigorous native laws 
and their code of morals. 



CHAPTER XV 



Polygamy &> Polyandry 

MONOGAMY, according to the generally accepted 
Bantu view-point, is a practice in vogue only 
among civilised people and poor blacks. The 
natives aver that our civilisation being based upon Chris- 
tianity and the Bible, we, to be true to our teaching, must 
keep to the one man one woman view of marriage and 
society. In Africa a native accepts and adheres to mono- 
gamy because of poverty, laziness, or inability to work for 
and support more than one woman. On the other hand, 
polygamists are usually hard workers and aristocrats ; men 
who by virtue of hard work and royal blood are able to 
work for and support a number of wives. In other words, 
where a savage state of society obtains polygamists are, as 
a rule, the best type of men and the most staunch up- 
holders of tribal life and customs. Of course, polygamists' 
families being large they have greater interests at stake ; 
more to gain and lose. Polygamy, why ? is a question that 
is easily asked but, to be fair to polygamists, it takes a lot 
of answering. Polygamy at its lowest estimate is by no 
means an easy outlet and argument for the satisfaction of 
lust. The propagation of the species and the consequent 
increase of population, with the upbuilding of a society 
that shall be held together by laws equally binding, coupled 
with the protection and mutual benefits derived therefrom 
fe, I think, one of the chief native arguments for polygamy. 
Sometimes war is the cause, for, by the killing off of males, 
here is a superfluity of females, and to prevent promiscuous 

159 



160 Polygamy Polyandry 



concubinage these are given to the warriors as slave wives, 
by which means the population is multiplied and the 
country enriched. Sometimes women are to blame, for I 
have heard native women again and again advocating poly- 
gamy and almost forcing — at any rate coaxing— their 
husbands to marry more and more wives. If the husband 
inconsiderately brings friends frequently for dinner and is 
fond of entertaining, the burden of all this falls, not on the 
husband but on the wife. If she is a monogamous wife 
she has all the water and firewood to get. She must mill 
sufficient meal and cook and prepare and entertain as 
becomes a good wife. If, on the other hand, the same man 
is a polygamist the work is divided up and each of the wives 
takes her turn at preparing the food and entertaining the 
guests. Therefore from the housewife's point of view 
polygamy is easier on the woman. There are, on the other 
hand, many women who object to a polygamous marriage 
and who prefer to be the only wife. With the break-up of 
tribal power, with slavery, and with native wars women are 
not so numerous, and many men are settling down to a 
monogamous state by sheer force of circumstances. Women, 
too, in Katanga, Angola, and Rhodesia are more and more 
insisting on monogamy and equal rights, and European 
law upholds them. Of course the period of pregnancy and 
maternal duties necessitates — according to native law — the 
woman living apart from the husband, and this enforced 
abstinence has been held up by many as a sound and irrefut- 
able argument against monogamy. Some friends of missions, 
from motives of sympathy with missionaries and their work 
on the West Coast, propounded what was facetiously called 
" the feeding bottle theory." I think, however, that the 
question of polygamy with many other difficult questions j 
will, from the negro view-point, be settled in time as 
African civilisation advances, just as such questions were 



Polygamy Polyandry 161 

settled by Britons in early days when polyandry obtained, 
and it was the custom for one woman to be wife to all the 
brothers in the family. To put the clock back, Briton and 
Bantu had much in common both as to laws, customs, 
and the moral code. Jerome tells of the cannibalism of 
the early Britons amongst whom he lived, who were no whit 
behind the cannibals of the Congo. Does polygamy pro- 
duce better and bigger families ? I think that this ques- 
tion will require a lot of settling, and by experts in eugenics 
rather than by the ordinary observer from ordinary points 
of view. I should say that polygamy does produce bigger 
families, all things being equal, but as to their being better 
families, i.e. physically, mentally, and every other way, I 
do not for a moment believe that this is so. I have seen a 
monogamous wife with a family of ten, and I have seen a 
large number of barren polygamous wives. 

Where the matriarchal system prevails and children belong 
to the mother, barrenness is looked on as a curse, whereas 
with the prevalence of the patriarchal system means are 
often used to prevent the birth of children. The natives 
have long been in possession of medicines which seem 
permanently to kill all fertility, and many chiefs' poly- 
gamous wives have sought to, and do, prevent families by 
these known means, preferring to have children by means 
of slave women whom they give to their husbands for this 
purpose, as they profess to dislike and object to the in- 
convenience of childbirth. Of course the children of a 
polygamous marriage lack the opportunity of training and 
care that is usually bestowed on the fewer children result- 
ing from a monogamous marriage. One of the chief 
arguments I have seen adduced against polygamy is the 
fact that owing to jealousies many polygamists are poisoned 
by their polygamous wives, who complain of neglect. I 
have known many instances of this, and one in particular 



1 62 Polygamy i§f Polyandry 

where trie one wife, out of jealousy, poisoned the other's 
child and was hanged for murder in the Congo. The usual 
way to avenge supposed insults was to make beer and invite 
the spouse to drink, he being handed a poisoned cup. The 
explanation given in extenuation is, " Well, if I am killed 
for it I have the satisfaction of depriving my enemy of his 
caresses, for I shall have killed him." Native men usually 
know the evils and jealousies resulting from polygamy, and 
are as a rule careful to try and avoid giving offence to the 
lesser wives, by sharing their favours all round. 

The puzzle of the polygamous family tree is a by no 
means easily solved or soluble one. To get up towards a 
twentieth wife with her family and to find and define 
relationships between family No. 20 and family No. 2, or 
with the other eighteen families, would take a specially 
developed mathematical mind and an intimate lifelong 
residence among polygamous natives, plus a congenital 
knowledge of their language and system, such as one finds 
sometimes in European children born and brought up in 
the country. Native women are very thin-skinned and 
sensitive. I remember being roused up one morning in 
Bihe by an awful hubbub, as though some one were 
being murdered near my house. I ran out in my pyjamas 
expecting to see some one speared or hacked to pieces with 
an axe. Instead I saw a native woman with her hands 
clasped around her head. She was crying, and the big tears 
were coursing down her cheeks as she ran along the road. 
" What is it, woman ? " I asked. " Oh," she said, " my 
husband spoke roughly to me and I'm going home to my 
mother " (veyange wamopia. Ngenda ku mat). 

I remember a young fellow returning from the mines 
with clothes and money he had brought affectionately 
back for his young wife whom he had left behind. She, 
however, had heard during his absence that he was dead 



Polygamy <§f Polyandry 163 

and had married another. The youth was so broken that 
he ran off to the forest and committed suicide by hanging 
himself to the branch of a tree, where he was found dead 
the following day. 

Polyandry as practised among the Indian hill tribes was 
practised among the Scots in North Britain in Jerome's 
day, and is common, in some form or other, among many 
Central African tribes at the present day. Among the 
Wemba and tribes in Northern Rhodesia it is only per- 
mitted to the Inamfumu, or " mother of kings," who can 
choose any man that takes her fancy ; she also chooses her 
own consort after the consummation of puberty ceremony, 
leads him to the royal hut, and if no children result, can 
put him away and choose another, and yet others. The most 
striking instance of tribal polyandry is practised by the 
Luena of Angola, and I believe that the neighbouring Lunda 
tribe also practise it. Evidences of the general practice of 
polyandry by Luena women is seen everywhere and they 
have an intricate and secret code of assignation signals by 

i which any woman may call to her any man she may choose 
pro tern. Young boys are used by these women as " go- 
betweens," and thus as they grow up they drift into the 
universally recognised practices of their elders. 

|j The queen of the whole tribe was a woman of remark- 
able ability and personal character named Nya-Katolo. 
The history of her springing into power, conquering the 
:ountry she occupied, and subjugating the surrounding 
tribes is very interesting reading. About fifty years ago 
>he lived on the Luena River. For the purpose of conquest 
she got together an army and fought her way through the 

(countries intervening between the Luena River and the 
£avungu stream. She scattered every force that opposed 
Ler and established villages at the head of which she put 
vomen chiefs. She eventually reached the Kavungu 



164 Polygamy &* Polyandry 



stream, where she built her capital, and from there sent out 
war parties and broke up the then waning power of 
Matiamvo. Her warriors returned from these raiding 
expeditions laden with booty and slaves, and these were 
sold to Biheans for guns, gunpowder, and trade goods, by 
which she maintained her prestige and extended her 
boundaries, as well as paying her soldiers and clothing her 
people. She instituted a system of women chiefs all over 
the countries she conquered, who were tributary to her 
and sent in regular caravans of tribute each new moon. | 
These women chiefs put in charge of villages were not 
chosen haphazard, mere nondescripts from anywhere, but 
carefully selected ladies of strong personality, many of | 
whom were well fitted for the posts of headwomen andi 
chieftainesses. At the capital and at many centres where! 
trading caravans from the coast or the interior halted to buy 
food and replenish their meal bags the female prerogative] 
was utilised, and these chieftainesses used to send their] 
women-folk with men bullies to entice native traders with! 
the ultimate object of robbing them. Immediately the! 
women entered the trader's hut a man who was lying in , 
wait pounced on the unsuspecting native trader and accused 
him of robbing him of his wife. Thereupon he was robbed, 
and I have seen such unwary men stripped of all they 
possessed, having to return to their country semi-naked. 

The Luena tribe is one of the most debased and immoral 
I have seen and a tribe of regular highway robbers, who 
used to attack and plunder caravans, holding guns at their! 
victims' heads and making them literally " stand and 
deliver." With my caravan I was attacked on four occa- 
sions by armed bands of local Luenas while passing peaces 
fully through their country, and we were plundered. 

Mahanga was one of Msidi's queens, a tall, handsome 
Luban woman with arms and legs encircled in ivory, and 



Polygamy & Polyandry 165 



head stylishly coiffured by her many maids. The chief 
made her his mugodi or " head wife." Though of chiefly 
lineage, she was caught in a raid by one of Msidi's war 
parties and carried back a prisoner to his capital. Her 
beauty captivated the old roue king and he installed her as 
one of his chief queens, giving her almost unlimited powers 
of which she was not slow to avail herself. After Msidi's 
death she was inherited by his son and successor, Mukanda 
Bantu, whose wife she became and bore him two sons. 
She was certainly a remarkable woman of powerful person- 
ality ; an Amazon who led her regiment to battle in person, 
and I have seen her perform a war-dance with a pile of 
over twenty heads in front of her. She had her own 
following of men and women and about a dozen maids 
who regularly waited on her. Her word was law, and I 
might say she was the most feared woman in the Katanga. 
She was a notorious poisoner and the name of " witch " 
from the Bantu standpoint applied to her if such could be 
applied to any African. She was such a notorious poisoner 
that she never ate food outside her own house. At a 
school distribution of prizes I remember asking her to 
join in the feast, and the look of refusal she gave me I am 
not likely to forget. Said she : " I never eat outside my 
own house." My excuse for introducing her here is that 
she was a notorious polyandrist whose lovers were legion, 
and woe betide the hapless man to whom she took a dislike. 
I remember distinctly one occasion where three men were 
knocked on the head, sacked, and thrown to the crocs in 
the Lufira River by her orders. She said they insulted 
her. After Msidi II died she retired with her son to the 
home of her youth in Lubaland. This son, named Mafinge, 
is one of the most powerful chiefs on the Lualaba 
River, and like his mother one of the most arrant rogues 
u .o be found anywhere in Africa. Mahanga means " the 



1 66 Polygamy fif Polyandry 

persecutor/ 5 and Mafinge means " the man of curses." 
No misnomers ! 

The third of the trio of polyandrous queens was Ina- 
Kafwaya of Kazembe's Lunda people in North-East 
Rhodesia. She was the leading lady in the Lunda country 
along the Luapula River, and a photo of her appears in 
Dr. Livingstone's Last Journals, Last time I saw her she 
must have been well over a hundred years old. Nya-Katolo, 
queen of the Ba-Luena of Portuguese Angola, Mahanga, 
Msidi's handsome Zenobia of Katanga, and Ina-Kafwaya, 
queen of the Eastern Lunda tribe of North-East Rhodesia, 
were certainly from every point of view three of the most 
remarkable women I have seen or heard of in Central Africa. 
Their names are immortalised in scores of songs of love 
and war, and they are not likely to sink into historic oblivion 
for another fifty years or more. 

I cannot finish this chapter of polygamy and polyandry 
without referring and paying a just tribute to the brave 
polygamous wives of the Yeke chief Chamunda of Katanga. 
He was sent north by Msidi to make war on the people of 
Chona in the Luba country and bring back slaves. The 
fighting was in full swing when Chamunda got a bullet 
that smashed his leg, and he would have been killed but 
for the plucky and dashing rescue of his wives. Some of 
them carried him off the field of battle, while others faced 
the foe and kept firing until the safety of their lord and 
master was assured. He bore about on his body until his 
death, some years ago, the mark and lameness got in that 
memorable Luban battle in Chona's country, a reminder 
of the debt that he owed to his brave bachima, which he I 
never failed to hold up to the itinerant missionaries who 
occasionally visited his village as a feather in the cap of 
polygamy. 



CHAPTER XVI 



Bantu Children 

THE birth of a baby is one of the great events in 
the life of every Bantu village, and the status of 
a woman is enhanced according to the size of her 
family, the potential commercial value of which is con- 
sidered a great asset. The public annunciation of coming 
maternity is always made the occasion of great rejoicing, 
but the coming of a new baby into the kraal is hailed with 
gun-firing, feasting, and giving of presents. Baby-birth 
is the big event in African village life. Granted the safe 
arrival of baby and the safety of the mother, who must be 
greeted after delivery with the words : " Are you saved ? " 
the question of next importance, asked and answered, is : 
" Is it a boy or a girl ? " The answer to this question in 
a land void of mock modesty is as crude as nude, for the 
baby is held up to public view to show its sex — male or 
female. One hears much of the custom in Oriental coun- 
tries of giving a special welcome to a boy because of his 
future commercial value as a trader, workman, or soldier, 
whereas we are told that female children are not wanted. 
In Bantuland, where the matriarchal system prevails, this is 
certainly not so, for the little girl is as warmly welcomed as a 
potential household help and mother, who by marriage 
will bring sons-in-law to the kraal. These will fish and hunt 
and hoe for the marriage relations. 

A baby girl is spoken of as a u little wife for somebody," 
and a boy as a " little husband," In fact, the baby girl is 

167 



i68 



Bantu Children 



often betrothed shortly after birth, yes, and oftener a 
betrothal is made long before the baby sees the light of 
day. When the baby is born, if parturition is difficult, and 
often before, a doctor is called, who divines and tells them 
that it is a dead relative who is being reincarnated, and 
his or her name is given to the child. If the birth is easy, 
and the baby gives no trouble, it is often looked on, not as 
a case of reincarnation, but as an ordinary birth, and the 
family come together to discuss a suitable name for their 
new-born. If the child is born on a Friday or Saturday 
it is called Friday or Saturday. If any event takes place, 
or a white man passes through the kraal at the time, it is 
called after the event or the white man. Thus a baby may 
be called Locust, Snake, Smallpox, or Elephant, Smith, 
Brown, or Jones. If it is a light- coloured child it may be 
called White, if dark it may be called Black. Hence a 
trader, or traveller, or Government official who moves 
about among the villages, may find a dozen different kraals 
all over the country where his name is bandied about. The 
" baby name " is only used temporarily, though it is re- 
tained permanently and is called " the umbilical name." 
By means of this name one can trace a thief who passes 
muster, otherwise, under a dozen aliases. Like the Arabs 
the Bantu children take the father's or family name. Thus, 
if a child's name is Sunday — having been born on that day 
— and the father's name is Market, the child is known as 
Sunday Market. Or, for the same reason, if the child's 
name is Saturday, and the father's name is Morning, the 
child is known by the name of Saturday Morning. Or if 
the child has slept much after birth and has earned the 
name of Sleepy, while the father's name is Sam, the child 
is called Sleepy Sam, and so on. 

Every baby at birth must receive a little first fetish, called 
Musamfu. This is made from a piece of reed about one 



Bantu Children 



169 



inch long, which is hollowed out inside, and a piece of the 
father's or mother's hair inserted into it. It is then 
perforated, a string passed through the hole, and passed 
round the child's left arm to protect it from evil influences. 
Baby must be made hardy, hence no dress allowance is 
made. The little boy has a thread passed round his waist, 
and the little girl the same, but she also has in addition a 
small piece of bark cloth two inches wide hung down in 
front like a doll's apron. Thus exposed to the weather the 
mortality among Bantu babies is appalling. Missionaries, 
to encourage dress, often give warm garments to babies, 
as " birth presents." By and by baby develops bronchitis, 
or other trouble, and the missionary is called in to help, 
when he finds to his disgust that the little garment has been 
carefully folded and laid aside, whereas the child has been 
exposed to cold and wind and rain. 

If a child cuts its lower incisors first it is a " lucky child," 
and receives life's justification mark — the white chalk. 
If other teeth sprout first the child is " unlucky," and 
condemned to be thrown into the river. 

When baby begins to speak or sprawl, all the aunts and 
uncles take great interest in their growing nephew or niece, 
and nothing pleases them better than to be allowed to hold 
or dandle it as it tries to say words or take a few first steps. 
" Mamma," the great world-word for mother, is usually 
the first word a black baby lisps, and very often it is the last 
word a dying native man or woman utters. In joy or sorrow, 
peace or war, this is one of the great words one hears con- 
tinually used. The first decoration of a child is usually a 
bead bracelet, or necklace, whereas the first dress for a boy 
consists in a small goatskin, simulating a pair of trousers, 
and called tunsudi ; that of a girl is a small piece of bark 
cloth, skin, or calico worn in front and behind. As a boy 
grows up he is initiated by his elders into the useful art of 



170 Bantu Children 

trapping young birds and rats, and catching fish for the pot. 
He learns from A to Z how to make traps and snares of all 
kinds, and rarely fails to bring home a few rats or a string 
of fish, a partridge or guinea-fowl, or even a small antelope 
for the sundown supper — the meal of the day. He alsot 
learns to dig up fibre, spin string, and make with his own 
hands a serviceable, small fishing net which he has already; 
become proficient in using. 

The difficulty in native schools is to get these boys to 
attend regularly, for they delight in playing truant as much 
as any English boy. I remember a number of these boys 
playing truant, which was a bad example, as the school had 
an average attendance of two hundred scholars. We: 
eventually pitted our wits against theirs, and after a long 
chase rounded them up in the river, returning from their 
expedition — a band of real Huck Finns, with strings of 
rats, fresh fish, birds (dead and alive), nests of eggs, and a 
quantity of caterpillars and other tasty grubs. They were 
marched back to school with their trophies, and lined up 
in front of the others, to the uproarious merriment of their 
schoolmates, who, in their hearts, lionised and envied 
them. 

Then the boys learn to work, and trade, or they may help 
in digging out a canoe, or building a new hut, or fencing 
the fields, or sowing seed, or selling meat or fish or other 
products. Thus, in the company and under the eye of the 
elders, they learn the facts and arts of life, which soon 
they will begin to practise on their own. The girl, mean- 
while, helps to nurse baby, or following her mother, will 
help her in the household or other duties which are con- 
sidered exclusively women's work. She may learn pottery, 
mat-weaving, basket-making, spinning cotton, or a dozen 
other things that girls do, and thus she grows up, as does the 
boy, to the early years of adolescence, when she is put 



Bantu Children 



171 



through the ceremonies prescribed by law and custom for 
her sex. 

Savage children are full of fun and are up to all sorts of 
mischief and games. They are fond of playing " See-Saw," 
and driving a peg in the stump of a big tree about three feet 
high, they cut a hole out of the centre of another log and 
place it on the peg. A boy then gets on each end, and they 
swing up and down, much as children do in other lands, 
but with this difference : that they also swing round as 
well. They sing while they swing, and shout to each other, 
and often one tries to swing the other off to increase the 
fun. Kampwe is another game they play. One boy gets 
hold of a live and supple branch of a tree and swings at 
the end of it ; the others push him and swing him higher 
and harder, and he must hold on and not fall. They sing 
as they swing him roughly : 

" Swing, sing, swing. 
Hang on to the branch. 
Look out ! If you fall, 
Your mother's a witch." 

If the boy lets go and falls they beat him and call him 
" the son of a witch," when a free fight ensues between 
the boy's chums and rivals. 

" Shooting the Pumpkin " is a favourite game. A 
pumpkin is thrown along the ground, and as it rolls they 
follow it with their toy bows and sharpened reed arrows, 
and shoot into it. I have seen the pumpkin stuck with 
arrows like a pin-cushion. Boys become very adept at this 
kind of archery, and learn thus to shoot at moving targets. 
Later, they practise on birds and game with great success. 
They play the same game throwing spears instead of shooting 
arrows. They make pop-guns from grass stalks called mpclo, 
which is the name of the game s They cut these green, 



172 



Bantu Children 



about three feet long, and tie them in bunches, and then 
they go to a rock alongside which they light a fire. They 
insert the end of the grass stalks in the fire, and then 
extract them hot, one at a time. They raise and strike the 
burnt end sharply on the rock, which causes an explosion 
like a young cannon. In the season when the grass is 
ripe they often carry on this pop-gun game for hours at 
a time. 

Fita is a war game, a kind of kriegspiel played by boys 
with rival camps, and regiments officered by the local 
Huck Finns and Tom Sawyers. The parties each form 
camps, and build their huts at a distance from each other. 
Then they draw up in line as warriors, and when the war 
whoop is sounded they rush with mimic guns and spears 
and bows and arrows and fight a mimic battle. They often 
get serious, and there is a lot of lively horseplay, and when 
one party is considered beaten they retire with yells of 
defiance. The victors set up a shout, dp a war-dance, and 
sing boisterously to announce their victory. 

Girls dance in a ring, taking hands, and sing as they circle 
round, just as girls do at home : 

" Play, play, play, 
All the day. 
That's our work 
For this year." 

This game is called after the first word in the song, 
Sampala. 

Diavolo is played by boys with great dexterity. The game 
dies out from time to time and again breaks out afresh, 
when boys may be seen everywhere in the villages throwing 
their " diavolo," which they call shingwa. 

Mupila, a ball game, is also played by boys and young 
men, and they put tremendous energy into it, sweating in 



Bantu Children 



i?3 



the hot sun. One strikes the ball hard on the ground, and 
as it rebounds they all jump and clap their hands, after 
which each springs into the air to catch the returning ball. 
A boy may not catch it until he has first jumped and clapped 
his hands together. 

Kafifi, or " Blind Man's Buff," is a game which causes 
roars of laughter. The boy's eyes are covered, and he is 
chased and poked at by the others, who go as near him as 
they dare, and shout, " Catch me if you can." 

Top Spinning is another favourite game, and is played 
with the hard seeds of the mahogany tree found in the pods, 
or others similar. The rule is that several spin at a time in 
a hollowed-out, smooth circle, and try to knock out each 
other's " man." The game is called Mpeta. Bantu children 
make most of their own toys, save some few made for them 
by father and mother, or an uncle or aunt. Boys make 
their toy bows and arrows, toy guns and spears, toy hoops 
and all the paraphernalia of_ child's play life. In making 
these they show an ingenuity born of necessity that knows 
no law. In their ante-puberty years they often surpass 
1 in inventive genius the young folk of more favoured toy- 
shop lands. I have seen them with most cleverly made toy 
cycles and motor cycles (imitated), motor cars, trains, 
and two-funnelled steamers with small fires burning in an 
empty sardine tin in imitation of the real thing. They 
often steal their mother's clay used for pottery work, and 
model elephants, hippos, and all sorts of animals, wild and 
domestic. Girls make some of their dolls out of corn cobs, 
with clay heads, and beads for eyes and mouths. They 
wrap them up in bark cloth, and carry them about pick- 
a-back as the mothers do their babies. They nurse them 
and talk to them, and call them " my baby," and give them 
little pet names. When a little girl dies, her sister inherits 
her doll, but, if she has no sisters living, the dead child's 



i?4 



Bantu Children 



doll is ceremoniously buried in the grave beside her. 
They like to play at housekeeping, and make their own little 
sets of furniture. The girls are proud of their good looks, 
and very jealous, whereas the boys swagger and boast to 
others of their strength and speed. They also indulge 
in wrestling, racing, and canoe-paddling contests. 



CHAPTER XVII 



Surprise Stories 

THE following folk-lore stories will help to reflect 
the mentality of the Bantu peoples. They are 
in common use, but have never, so far as I know, 
appeared in print. 

Hump Navel and the Witch 

An old witch woman had been killing large numbers of 
people in the villages, and in one of these about that time 
a woman gave birth to a baby with a hump navel. The 
boy grew up and one day the mother took him to the cave 
where the old witch woman lived, and laying him at the 
mouth of the cave she went off to the forest to gather 
mushrooms. While looking about for mushrooms she met 
the old witch woman, who killed her and ate her. Then the 
sun went down and darkness fell, and the child thought to 
himself : " Where has mother gone ? " Then the child set 
off to look for his mother, and finding her footmarks, he 
Followed them until he reached the spot where his mother 
lad been caught and killed. He went into the bush and 
:ut a tree and let it fall exactly at the spot where his mother 
lad been killed, and running behind a clump of trees holding 
lis father's spear tight in his hand, he hid himself. The 
vitch soon returned, and, looking down, said : " Who 
)ut that tree in the path ? There was no tree there when 

went away." Thereupon the boy sprang out and stabbed 
ter with his father's spear and killed her. Then he cut her 

175 



176 Surprise Stories 

stomach open, which was full of live people she had 
swallowed, and these commenced to shout and dance, and 
the people in the villages far and near on hearing the noise 
rushed to the spot. The mother of Hump Navel, springing 
out from the witch's belly, shouted : " That's my boy, 
that's my boy." The people all fell on their faces and, 
clapping their hands in gratitude, shouted aloud : " He's 
our chief, he's our chief now, for he saved us from the 
wicked old witch woman," and that was how Hump Navel 
became their chief. 

" A hump-navel child is a child of play, 
He sleeps by night and thinks by day." 

The Chief who Killed his Counsellors 

A big chief was persuaded by his head wife to kill all his 
counsellors, " for," said she, " it is they who are bewitching 
and killing the people in your town, with their knowledge 
of black magic." The king issued a proclamation throughout 
his country to call all the people and headmen together.; 
One boy had heard of the plot and was determined to save 
his father, and so warned him, saying : " Come, father, 
follow me, and I will hide you safely in a cave." He toot 
his father secretly and hid him in a cave, rolling a big stone 
to the mouth of it, and carried him food there from day to 
day. When his people and counsellors gathered, the chief 
addressed them and said : " I don't want any more coun- 
sellors for they are killing my people ; I only want boys." 
Therefore he killed all his elders and counsellors. 

Shortly after this event the chief was lying asleep under 
a tree when a great python came and coiled himself round 
the chief's body and neck, and pointed his fangs at his eyes. 
The people rushed about saying : " What shall we do ? 
A deadly snake has coiled itself round our chief. If we 



Surprise Stories 177 

spear it we may kill the chief." No one knew how to save 
the chief, and the python, meanwhile, was tightening his 
coils and slowly crushing him to death. The boy remembered 
his father, and ran away secretly to the cave and told him. 
" All right," said the father, " that's not difficult. Go, 
my son, with a hoe and dig up a big field rat, tie it to the end 
of a string and dangle it in front of the python's eyes. 
He will gradually let go his hold of the chief, uncoil himself, 
and follow the live rat on the string." The boy caught a 
rat and tied it to a string and did as his father told him. 
And so when the python saw the live rat he uncoiled himself 
from the chief's neck. The boy went farther back with the 
rat, and the snake followed, gradually uncoiling himself 
from the chief's body and legs until the chief was free. 
[ The people then killed the python, and their chief was 
; saved. The chief then called the boy into a hut and said : 
r Tell me, boy, where you got that wisdom." At first 
re refused, and said: " No, chief, it's my own idea." 
rjrhe chief said : " No, but you must have hid your father 
omewhere. Tell me, and I will give you one of my daughters 
be your wife and you shall be my son-in-law." On being 
ssured he went to the cave and called his father, who came, 
nd the chief was so pleased that he gave him an important 
hieftainship and his daughter in marriage, besides loading 
im with many presents. This is the story of the chief 
rho took his wife's advice and killed his counsellors. 



The Hare, the Lion, and the Earless Boy 

A famine broke out all over the land, and the people all 
ed off save one woman who was about to give birth to a 
iby. She said to herself : " I'm off elsewhere, for I don't 
mt to give birth to my child in a foodless village full of 
< ad people." She went away, and finding a mountain 

I " 



178 Surprise Stories 

climbed to the top and made a bower, where her baby was 
born — a fine, big boy. She went off from time to time 
to get mushrooms, which she cooked and ate. Each time 
she went she said to her boy, warning him : " Play on the 
top of the hill and see you don't go down below." One 
day a hare came up the hill, and seeing the boy, said : 
" Oh, I'm so glad to see you, I hope you are well, little 
nephew." Then the mother brought cooked mushrooms 
which they all ate, and afterwards the hare and the boy 
played on the hill-top. Each day the hare went home at 
sundown. One day, when the mother was away gathering 
mushrooms, the hare said : " Come, nephew, and let us 
play on the side of the hill ; there's flowers and lots of nice 
things." They went and played and then returned for 1 
food. At sundown the hare went off as usual. Next day 
the mother went off early to gather mushrooms. The hare 
came and said to the boy : " Let's go down the hill to-day.'" 
" Oh, no," said the boy, " I can't do that, for mother tolda 
me not to." " Oh," said the hare, " it's all right, we cani 
be back before mother's return." And they went. They! 
got to the bottom of the hill and began to play, when a lion! 
appeared and caught the boy and killed him. The lionj 
went off for a stroll, leaving the hare to cook the meat.j 
The hare quickly cut off the ears, cooked and ate them while? 
the lion was away. When the lion returned he said : 
" I'm hungry, bring the food." He looked through the 
meat, but could find no ears. " What have you done with 
the ears, hare ? " said the lion. " Oh," replied the hare, ; 
" that boy had no ears." " Oh, you lie, little animal," 
said the lion. " All animals and human beings have ears." 
" All right, listen," said the hare, and he called to the 
mother on the hill-top, who was crying like to break her 
heart for her lost boy, " I say, woman, had your boy any 
ears ? " " No," answered the mother, " he had no ears, 



Surprise Stories 179 

for if he had he would have listened to me and not 
disobeyed, leaving me childless." This is the story of the 
boy who had no ears. 

The Man who Hunted with the Devil 

A man went out to dig a game-pit at the edge of his 
field in the forest. He dug and dug longways of the fence 
until the pit was deep enough. Then he looked at it and 
thought : " How can game be caught in a pit dug the 
wrong way ? " As he was talking to himself the devil 
appeared and greeted him. Looking at the newly dug pit 
the devil began to laugh, saying : " Whoever saw a man 
dig a game-pit that way ? it's all wrong. You won't catch 
any game in that. Look here," said the devil, " I'll help 
you, and together we'll catch lots of game. Get a hold of 
a corner of the pit and I'll take the opposite corner and 
we'll turn the pit right round." They did so and fixed it 
up nicely. " Now," said the devil, " I don't eat beef, but 
I want the liver, the heart, and the kidneys for my trouble." 
; " Agreed," said the hunter, and he went home to sleep. 
Next day he returned to the pit in the early morning and 
ound a roan antelope caught. The devil appeared, saying : 
' Success, friend ! " (Bambeni). " Yes," said he, " we've 
:aught a roan antelope." Said the man : " I'm off to the 
dllage to get help to carry the meat home." " What ? " 
aid the devil. " Who helped you with the pit ? Wasn't it I ? 
^ome,come, give me the liver, heart, and kidneys, as agreed." 
The devil then caught the antelope by the tail and the 
aan caught it by the legs, and they dragged it out of the 
it and the devil got his titbits. The man returned to his 
tllage and said : " I've caught a roan in the trap, but it's 
lot no liver, heart, or kidneys." "No," said the chief, 
you're mistaken." They went, however, and cut up the 



i8o Surprise Stories 

meat and brought it home, but the liver, etc., were missing. 
Next day the hunter went back and found an eland in his 
pit. The devil again put in an appearance and demanded 
his share. " No," said the hunter, " I got into trouble last 
time and I must not do it again." " Oh," said the devil, 
" did your friends help you to fix your pit ? Wasn't it 
I ? " So he gave him the heart, liver, and kidneys. He 
went to the village and told the chief and people again, , 
and the chief was very angry, saying : " You lie : you've 
eaten them yourself in the forest." He protested, but 
they only laughed at him. They went and cut up the 
meat and brought it home, when the chief was very angry. 
Next morning he went off to his game-pit early and found 
a buffalo caught. The devil, who was waiting in hiding 
behind a tree, again appeared and claimed his share as 
before. " Oh," said the man, " you'll have me killed this 
time." The devil said : " All right, when your chief and 
people come I shall refer the case to them for decision." 
So he gave him his share. The hunter returned with the 
same story as before. The people threatened to kill him, 
and he confessed that he had hunted with the devil, who 
had helped him to straighten his game-pit, which accounted 
for his success and the price he had to pay. The chief and 
people went with him this time, and on arrival at the pit, 
the devil, who was hiding, came out and stated his case to 
the chief and people. He told how he helped the man and 
of the agreement to pay him heart, liver, and kidneys as the 
price of his help. " Now," said the devil to the hunter, " if 
you want to be rid of me, pay me for your slander and my 
share in the work of fixing the game-pit." The chief justified 
the devil and condemned the hunter to pay up a heavy 
fine. The devil then left, and the people cut up the 
buffalo and carried the meat home to their village. This 
is the story of the man who hunted with the devil. 



Surprise Stories 



181 



The Bushman, or, You'll always Remember Me 

A hunter went out one day and shot a sable antelope. 
The people came and helped him to cut it up and carry 
it home and were very happy over the meat, singing and 
dancing. Another day he killed an eland, and the chief and 
people were delighted at the large quantities of meat 
being brought home. Another day the hunter wandered 
all day through the forest, but had no luck. Suddenly, on 
returning home, he saw vultures and knew there was a 
dead antelope near. He went into the thicket and found 
a dead bull hartebeest. He had an axe and no knife, and 
wondered how he could cut up so much meat without a 
knife. He heard a noise of a man cutting a wild plum tree 
for the fruit. He called : " Come, friend, and help me, 
I've picked up a dead hartebeest." The hunter borrowed 
his knife and cut up the meat, and they slept all night in 
a hut they built close by. In the morning the hunter cut 
a pole and tied the meat to it and was about to return 
home. The bushman whose knife he borrowed said : " Is 
that how you treat me for my help which you sought ? " 
" Oh no," said the hunter, " the meat is mine ; I found 
it, not you." " All right," said the bushman, " but you'll 
always remember me and think of me from now." When 
he reached the first river he laid down his load to rest and 
drink. But he couldn't forget the bushman and his words. 
He went on till he reached a second river and laid down his 
ioad to rest and drink, but he couldn't get rid of the 
■ -.nought of the bushman and his words : " you'll remember 
jne." Finally he reached the village and the people 
greeted him with shouts of welcome. They cooked meat 
I nd food and laid it at the door of the hut where he had 
; ;one to rest. He tried to eat, but couldn't, for thinking 
pf the bushman and his last words: 6 ' you'll remember 



1 82 Surprise Stories 

me." Day after day his appetite failed and he grew thin 
and emaciated. The chief asked him the cause of his ill- 
ness, and he told him of his experience with and unfair 
treatment of the bushman. " Well," said the chief, " you 
were in the wrong and acted unjustly. Go now and take 
seven hoes with you as a present, confess your wrong to 
him and pay him up." He took the hoes and a present 
besides, searched for the bushman and found him. " Ho, 
friend," he said, " I wronged you and have come to pay 
you for the wrong I did you in not giving you a share of 
the meat for the loan of your knife." The bushman 
received it and said : " All right, your appetite will come 
back. Go home and live prosperously." This is the story 
of the hunter who wronged the bushman and what he 
suffered. 

The Mother and the Fairy Nursemaid 
(Nsambu ya chibanda) 

An orphan girl was married as a polygamous wife and 
had a young baby to nurse. The husband cultivated a field 
of millet for her and fenced it to keep out the pigs, and 
when the grain was ripe she took her baby with her to the 
field to harvest her crop. She found it difficult to nurse 
the baby and cut the grain at the. same time, and she sat 
down to cry : " Oh, that I had a mother or sister to help 
me." Suddenly there appeared a wicked fairy, who said 
to her : " Poor child, you've got no mother to help you. 
I'll help you and nurse the baby for you while you cut 
your grain." The fairy took her baby away and nursed 
it and brought it back in the evening. The girl took her 
child on her back, a basket of grain on her head, and went 
off home. The second day she did the same and the 
fairy mother came as before and nursed her baby, walking 
round the forest with it. The third day the grain was 



Surprise Stories 183 

nearly all harvested, and the wicked fairy turned up, but 
though she did not show it she was angry at not receiving 
any remuneration for the previous two days' work. She 
took the child, however, but when she got outside the 
fence she cut its head off and laid it down at the entrance 
to the field, hiding the remainder of the child's body. 

The mother finished her work and called to the fairy to 
bring her child, but no answer came. She called and called : 
" My child, oh my child, where have they taken you ? " 
She looked but could not find it and prepared to return 
home. On leaving her field she found her baby's head 
lying in the gateway. She took it up tenderly and carried 
it, crying all the way home. When she reached her house 
her husband said : " Where's the baby ? " " Oh," she 
said, " I put it under a tree and while I was working some 
wild beast killed it, and I found its head in the entrance 
to the field." " Why did you not look after the child ? " 
said the father ; " this is all your fault ; let's go now to 
the field and search for the body." On the way to the 
field the wicked fairy appeared with the child's body 
wrapped in a skin and hid under her arm, and said : " What 
are you looking for ? " They replied : " Our baby." She 
then produced the body, which they recognised. " Let's 
go to the chief," said the wicked fairy, " and put the matter 
before the court." They did so, and each told their story. 
The chief gave verdict that the fairy was justified, because 
the woman attempted to defraud her of the lawful wages 
due. This is the story of the mother and the fairy nurse. 

The Man who Hid the Honey 
(Kaonde country) 

A long time ago a man and woman married and five 
children were born to them. A famine broke out in their 



184 Surprise Stories 

district, and as no food was procurable the father went off 
to the forest and found a hollow tree with honey. 

He dug it out with his axe, and bringing it home hid it in a 
pot. He went out at night and dug a deep hole in the ash- 
pit and hid the pot of honey there. He inserted a long reed 
in the pot, which projected a little bit above the ground, 
and levelling it all round with ashes he went away. Each 
day when he was hungry he came and sucked at the reed, 
and one day his children saw him do this. " What are you 
doing, father ? " they asked. " Oh, I'm eating ashes, my 
children, I'm so hungry." The boys were astonished at 
their father, and struck up a little song : 

" Father's eating ashes, 
Hunger makes him mad. 
Father's eating ashes, 
Hunger is so bad." 

One day the elder son watched the father go to the 
forest to hunt for honey. He ran to the ash-heap, and 
taking the reed in his mouth he sucked, and was surprised 
to get mouthfuls of nice sweet honey. He sucked till he 
almost burst, and then he went and told his mother and 
the others and they all came and sucked till they emptied 
the pot. They filled it up with water and ashes and re- 
placed the reed. The father came back, saying : " Oh, I'm 
so hungry, children, I'm off to eat ashes. Come and sing 
to me, my children." They went and struck up their little 
song to father : 

" Father's eating ashes, 
Hunger makes him mad. 
Father's eating ashes, 
Hunger is so bad." 

Immediately he got mouthful after mouthful of ashes, 
which made him angry. He raked aside the ashes and 



Surprise Stories 185 

found the honey pot had been emptied during his absence, 
and filled with ashes and water. " Why did you do this ? " 
said the infuriated father. " Oh, we only followed your 
example, dad." 

The father was so ashamed at his selfishness, and at being 
found out by his wife and children, that he went and hid 
himself. This is the story of the selfish man who hid the 
honey. 

The Magic Mat 

About a hundred years ago there lived a chief named 
Munkombwe, who belonged to the pottery clan and who 
was a famous elephant hunter and soldier. The village 
where he lived was on the south bank of the Kalunguizi 
River in North-East Rhodesia. He was reputed to be in 
possession of a magic mat which he jealously guarded and 
only used for crossing rivers and swamps. When he went to 
war or returned with spoil he always crossed the river on 
his mat. When he went elephant-hunting in the Mweru 
marsh or returned with trophies of the chase he spread his 
mat at the river ferry and crossed quickly and safely while 
others had to wait for canoes. When he died his mat dis- 
appeared and his two successors knew nothing of its where- 
abouts. This is the story of the magic mat. 



CHAPTER XVIII 



Hunting & Fishing 

A MONG the primitive peoples of Bantuland Hunt- 
/% ing and Fishing developed under the lash of 
JL JL necessity's stern law and not from any sentimental 
idea known as " love of sport." Men attacked elephant, 
buffalo, lion, etc., in simple obedience to the primal law of 
self-preservation, or to provide food for themselves and 
families. They did not hesitate to run up to within three 
yards of a bull, elephant, or buffalo and drive a heavy spear 
into the great brute's vulnerable part at real personal risk 
of life and limb. Fighting was the common word used for 
attacking big game with primitive weapons, and the hunter 
who came safely back from the chase was welcomed as a hero 
returning from war by the men and women of his kraal, 
with clapping of hands and songs, war-paint and feathers. 
Many a time I have heard this expression used by a returning 
hunter, twalwa nabo, i.e. " we fought them," meaning 
elephants, buffalo, or lions, or any dangerous game. As a 
rule these negro Nimrods are modest men who rarely sing 
their own praises or speak even of tight corners they have 
been in, until pressed or persuaded to recount their experi- 
ences by Europeans eager to hear. I have heard a man tell 
how he fought lion, leopard, or crocodile, without the 
least thought of vanity or desire to draw attention to 
himself. I have heard a man tell how he was tossed into 
a tree by a charging buffalo, or caught up by an elephant 
and hurled into the air, or thrown along the ground, and 

1 86 



Hunting &* Fishing 187 

how he narrowly escaped death, at the same time showing 
the scars as though it were a matter of everyday occurrence. 
Though the impelling and initial law of the chase is stark 
necessity, I have seen and known many a famous black 
hunter with the true sportsman instinct very highly 
developed, and the love of sport as strongly in evidence as 
among the best hunters of the white race. I have hunted 
many times with Msidi II and many other hunter chiefs, 
and headmen of the interior, and I have found very few 
to whom the title of " good sport " and " jolly good 
fellow " could not be truthfully applied. I do not refer 
to the ordinary rank and file of white men's followers, but 
to native and professional big-game hunters, who have 
been tested and proved again and again, and whose pluck 
and sang-froid in an ugly corner left very little to be desired. 

On the other hand, more than once I have known white 
men come swaggering back laden with a caravan of ivory 
which they claimed as having fallen to their guns, and have 
heard them tell stories of charging and furious elephants, 
when I knew that these same Jumbos had been shot by 
natives with the white men's guns, while the latter were 
safely seated in their tents drinking tea. I have also seen 
white men return from a journey with record horns and 
unique big-game heads and heard them tell how they 
shot them, and in the evening passing casually through the 
camp I have heard the same man's cook tell his chums with 
a twinkle in his eye where his master bought them, and 
how many yards of calico they cost. I have seen a photo 
of a white man, gun in hand, in hunting costume standing 
hunter-like alongside two dead lions poisoned with strych- 
nine. It is a common thing to-day in the Congo and 
Angola for white traders to take out an elephant licence 
and employ natives to do the hunting and killing and 
taking of risk, while they claim the credit and the tusks. 



1 88 Hunting &> Fishing 

There used to be tribes who distinguished themselves as 
elephant hunters and had always large quantities of ivory 
to sell. The Sanga, Lamba, Luba, and Wemba were four 
such tribes among whom were large numbers of famous 
elephant hunters. These usually had a society, or guild, 
with initiation rites and ceremonies, and laws and regula- 
tions that had to be obeyed under pain of expulsion. 

There used to be great tribal hunts, too, when hundreds 
of elephants would be driven into a cul-de-sac of the river 
and speared. Sometimes they would be driven into 
swamps, where they would stick fast in the mud, and the 
hunters would go round and finish them off at leisure. At 
other times great spears were set in the path of a herd of 
elephants, and the big bull in front would step on a stick 
cunningly covered, releasing the spear above, which would, 
thus released, plunge itself into the neck of the great 
brute, which would stagger along and die of its wound in 
a short time, or be attacked and finished by the hunters 
who followed the blood spoor. Sir S. Baker tells how the 
Abyssinians would hamstring elephants with sharp swords 
and afterwards kill them by hand. Of course many hunters 
were annually killed in those days when weapons of high 
velocity and precision were unknown. Even with flint- 
locks and percussion cap guns, natives are frequently killed. 
On the other hand, I have known a native hunter who shot 
his three elephants a day, and during his life he must 
certainly have slain hundreds of elephants. On approach- 
ing a herd he would scatter his fetish medicine, then picking 
out the big bulls, would proceed to shoot elephant after 
elephant. He died only recently. His name was Mutwila, 
brother of Mpande, chief of the Basanga. 

I have never shot or seen a rhino, though natives some- 
times come across them and shoot them. The rule is, I am 
told, that when the rhino dung is intact he is not far away 



Hunting & Fishing i8g 



and usually returns to scatter it. The hunter, arriving and 
seeing this, hides in a tree near by, and when the rhino 
puts in an appearance to scatter his dung prior to departure, 
the hunter gets his chance. The rhino has an ugly habit 
of charging through a passing caravan, greatly to the annoy- 
ance and amusement of travellers. 

On the Luapula, where I lived many years, buffalo were 
plentiful and natives used to drive them into the river and 
chase and kill them in canoes with long spears. I have 
seen native hunters again and again follow wounded buffalo 
into long grass or into dense bush or thickets. The native 
is very daring and does not hesitate to run big risks when 
bent on killing buffalo. I have seen a native hunter chased 
by a charging, wounded buffalo, which I killed at a few 
yards with my 400 express rifle. As stated in my chapter 
on sport and travel, buffalo is the most dangerous of all 
game. Sometimes they fall into deep game-pits and are 
easily despatched, and sometimes they are killed by poisoned 
arrows, in which case the hunter has to get very near so that 
the arrow penetrates deeply. 

Eland are often caught and killed in game- pits dug along 
the field fences, where they come and destroy large quanti- 
ties of food in the native gardens and break up the fencing. 
A herd of eland can ruin a native family in one night. 
Why governments put them in the elephant category 
I do not know, unless it is to increase revenue. Among big 
game the eland is the native's great enemy. For two years 
I had to buy a .£25 licence for game as eland was the only 
game meat near my place, and I had to furnish food for a 
large camp. The native loves hippo-hunting with harpoons, 
and goes at it with great zest. Many natives used to lose 
their lives annually in hippo hunts. They also set heavy 
hafted spears for them in the paths where they left the 
river to feed at night. Hippo are valued for their meat, 



i go Hunting &> Fishing 

fat, and hides which are used for whips, while their tusks 
used to be sold to Arabs to make handles for their swords 
and daggers. Arabs give a good price for hippo ivory. 

Otter hunting and trapping is carried on about Lake 
Bangweulu, where thousands are trapped and speared 
annually. I used to buy these long ago at 4d. each, and 
to-day they sell locally at 3s. 6d. per pelt. They are very 
plentiful among the swamps round the lake and on the 
Luapula River, and the natives are very fond of their flesh. 

On Lake Bangweulu great tribal battues take place every 
year, when the grass is burned off and thousands of black 
and red Lechwe antelopes, besides Sititunga antelopes and 
otters, are killed. They hunt these among the swamps in 
canoes or on the islands with spears and bows and arrows, in 
the use of which they are particularly dexterous. They 
also use long nets and packs of fierce dogs. They delight 
in these cynegetics and are wonderfully attached to their 
wild dogs, and are rarely to be seen without them. The 
flesh of the game is dried and sold to the people of the main- 
land ; and beautiful shawls are made from the skins, which 
are well brayed and worked into pretty patterns. These 
are in great demand and most Baunga and Batwa women 
wear them as dresses or use them to carry their babies 
pick-a-back. 

Some of these hunter tribes are expert at imitating bird 
and animal calls. I have watched them bring birds and 
animals to within a few yards of them by the perfect way 
in which they imitated the bird or buck. It is quite pathetic 
to watch the way a duiker antelope or reed buck will come 
trustingly to within observation distance before discover- 
ing its mistake. Guinea-fowl, partridge, and duck do the 
same. They sometimes use reeds or leaves or horns as calls 
for bird and buck, and with these clever imitations they 
decoy them to perfection. The natives make powerful 



Hunting & Fishing 191 

bows and strong steel-pointed arrows, some of which can 
pierce the thick hide of a buffalo. I have seen them shoot 
and kill with the first arrow, and some are expert archers. 
Formerly they used these in war, and do still in some parts. 
They often poison their arrow-points, which are also 
frequently barbed, and death ensues in a very short time 
from tetanus. Lieut. Hankinnson, a Belgian officer, was 
killed in the early years by a poisoned arrow. Spears are 
much used, the biggest of which is the elephant spear ; 
it is some eight feet long, the haft about two inches thick, 
and has a powerful blade. Guns are much in evidence in 
Angola and throughout the Congo, but in North-East 
Rhodesia these are forbidden save to a few natives who are 
known to have no criminal record. Chiefs, however, are 
usually allowed one gun each to kill game for themselves and 
their people. In Angola and the Congo the flint lock and 
cap gun are too dangerously common, and ammunition can 
be too easily obtained by anybody at traders' stores, hence 
natives hunt and kill more game to-day than in the early 
days. In the Katanga many natives do a regular trade in 
game meat at the mines and in the towns along the railway. 

Game-pits are often dug in the game tracks and I once 
picked up a nice pair of tusks in one where an elephant had 
met an untimely end. Hippo pits are cleverly constructed, 
and are very dangerously hidden ; I nearly lost my life once 
in one of these at the south bend of the Luapula River. 
They are big, and deep, and covered over with light 
saplings, leaves, and earth, which make them difficult of 
detection from the surrounding ground. Eland, roan, 
sable, and hartebeeste antelopes are often trapped in these, 
and my boys once got a lion in one of them near to my 
cattle pen. Pigs, small antelopes, guinea-fowls, and par- 
tridges are caught by means of snares set in the path. They 
are cleverly constructed, of various kinds, and rarely fail. 



1 92 Hunting & Fishing 

I have seen pig and antelopes caught and struggling in 
these. 

Nets are used for duiker and small antelopes, also for j 
Lechwe and Sititunga. These are stretched across the] 
forest or swamp, and half a dozen or more are caught at a 
time. The net is made of strong, thick cord, is set, and held 
in position by long forked sticks stuck in the ground. 
When all is ready the chief gives the word and the bush is 
beaten and the game are, with great noise and lullilooing, 
driven to the nets, where they are caught and afterwards | 
killed. There is a recognised native close and open season. 
When the grass is long in the rutting season hunters rarely 
go after game. When the grass is burnt the call to hunt 
sounds all over the land and, day after day, hunters go out 
with gun, spear, bows and arrows, nets and dogs, and hunt 
from sunrise to sunset. Sometimes the hunters camp in 
the forest where game is plentiful, and kill and smoke the 
meat of a number of animals before deciding to return 
home. 

There is a distinct class of hunter chiefs throughout the 
country who, by virtue of their prowess on the hunting 
field, have gathered together a following of natives, and 
have been given chieftainships by the lord paramount. 

These chiefs are looked down on by others as upstarts 
with no legal claim, though they are held in respect by 
many on account of the ivory and meat with which they 
supply the tribal larders. I know a large number of these 
whose only claim to chieftainship is based on the gun. They 
are usually fine fellows, head and shoulders above the 
ordinary type, in brain, brawn, and good breeding. 
Kasangu, a Yeke elephant hunter of repute, told me of an 
experience he had that nearly cost him his life. He was after 
a bull elephant which he had singled out as a big tusker when 
to his surprise a lion sprang on Jumbo before his very eyes. 



A Masked Devil-Doctor. Head of a 21-le. Tiger Fish. 

Headdress of Luban Chief. Headdress of Native Woman. 



Hunting <§f Fishing 193 

He rushed up, and seeing the fierce fight between these 
two forest giants, he shot the lion, which turned round and 
attacked him, and afterward followed on and shot the 
elephant. He eventually lost his foot and died on Lake 
Mweru, hugging his old elephant gun. Mulevi, an elephant 
hunter who lived on the Luapula River, killed enormous 
quantities of game. Suspicions having been aroused, one 
day he was followed, no snots being heard — and he returned 
to report having killed five head of game. Whispering 
went round the village that he practised lycanthropy, and 
that when he reached the buck he changed into a lion and 
pulled down as many as he wanted. He was tried for 
hunting by sorcery, and, with his nephew Kalaba who 
accompanied him, was sentenced to death by Chief Mulundu 
(at whose capital I lived) and burned as a game-wizard. 

Fishing is carried on in a larger variety of ways than in 
Europe. A fisherman is also called a hunter. Blacksmiths 
forge hooks of all sizes. I have seen scores of children in 
canoes on Lake Bangweulu fishing for carp and other fish 
with small barbless hooks. Larger hooks are used for 
monde, a kind of cod, some of which weigh from 40 to 80 lbs. 
Sometimes a number of hooks are fastened to long lines and 
left overnight, attached to a big float, when many fish are 
caught. Bamboo rods are used to angle only small fish. 
Many natives are quite expert at angling. Nets are made 
from fibre collected in various parts of the country. They 
spin it into cord, make it up into balls, then weave 
their nets with meshes of different size. Trammel lines 
are used top and bottom, with pith floats and stone sinkers. 
Little boys make small nets and their elders make longer 
md larger ones. Sometimes a party of fishermen form a 
ombine, join their nets, and stretch them across the river 
t a place where fish is plentiful. They then draw the net 
ound in a circle towards the shore, enclose it, and haul it 

N 



194 Hunting & Fishing 



up. They empty out the fish, which is shared alike by all 
the partners. They dry their nets in the sun, but have no 
system of barking. Long spears and forks like a trident 
are used to spear big fish, at which fish spearing the natives 
are very skilful. In the marshes where fish abound, but 
where nets and hooks are useless, they paddle their canoes 
through the reeds and use their spears. Large and small 
basket traps are used all over Africa, and these are made of 
reeds and bamboos. Some of these are six to nine feet 
long, conical-shaped, with a cleverly constructed entrance 
that is self-setting, closing as the fish go in. I have watche 
them on the Luapula take out hundreds of pounds of fis 
in a very short time. They sometimes make weirs and inser 
their basket fish traps at the openings intentionally left f o 
the purpose. All other parts are closed up with stones an 
clods. Diving for fish was resorted to at Johnston Falls b 
men called divers (mzvibilisbi), who could remain a long 
time under water. They told me that if a croc approached 
when they were fishing at the bottom among rocks, they 
held out to him a fish, and if he took it it was safe to 
continue, but if he refused to take it they got up to their 
canoes on the surface as quickly as possible. They used 
spears under water and fastened the fish caught to a cord 
tied round the waist so as not to hamper their movements. 
Buba, or fish poison (of which there are five kinds), is 
much used to kill fish in pools. The plant is grown by 
natives and the flowers and leaves are powdered, carried in 
baskets, and scattered over the pools. The fish turn up 
their bellies and are gathered by the fishing folk quickly, 
Fish poison seems to have a narcotic effect, for sometime.' 
the fish recover and escape. During the rains fish used tc 
come up the river to spawn. During the night they woulc 
enter small streams and scatter over the flooded plains. 
The natives in the morning promptly dammed th( 



Hunting & Fishing 195 



streams at the mouth, and when the water went back, the 
fish were left high and dry on the plains — which I have 
seen in the season literally white with fish. Tons of fish 
were thus caught, killed, and smoked annually, and the 
fisher-folk did good business in bartering with their land 
neighbours. Several European traders are now established 
near there, and send tons of these smoked fish (and also 
fresh) into Elisabethville by motor lorry. Fishermen fish 
during the day, but the best fishing is usually done at 
night. They place a bunch of dry inflammable firewood 
Cmzuenge) at the bow of the boat to attract the fish, and they 
then drive them to their nets by beating the water with 
their paddles as they approach the nets in a semicircle. I 
have gone out fishing with natives at night but found the 
mosquitoes bad. Tiger fish, when caught, are knocked on 
the head as they give a dangerous bite. I have the names 
of forty different kinds of fish found in Lake Bangweulu 
and the Luapula River. Crocs and otters account for 
large numbers of fish, so do ospreys, cormorants, and divers, 
and the little energetic kingfishers. Fish, if small, are pre- 
pared by sun-drying, if large by means of smoking over 
slow fires. For sun-drying the fish are spread out on mats 
or over the grass thatch of the hut. For smoking purposes 
stands are made of forked sticks and cross-pieces, and the 
fish are laid out on these, while the fire is kept going under- 
neath. They are not so particular in the choice of wood 
for smoking purposes as in Europe, hence the coarse smell 
and taste, and the fact that few Europeans can eat fish so 
preserved. 

Fishing tribes like the Bashila, Batwa, and Baunga, as 
well as the Angola fishing tribes, are despised by landsmen 
and called "water-beaters." Fishing people, when they 
travel or visit other tribes, always deny their fisher origin, 
and insist, somewhat facetiously, that they have never 



1 96 Hunting & Fishing 

heard of or even seen a fish. To some tribes, like the Yeke, 
fish is taboo. 

When the Shila fishermen go after cod on Lake Mweru 
they fish in puris naturalibus, and they have a peculiar 
cursing ceremony. When they reach mid-lake they drop a 
big stone at the stern and another at the stem as anchors. 
They then tie a hooked fishing-line to each hand and one 
to each foot, four in all. Then the fisherman commences 
to curse the dead who have been drowned, eaten by crocs, 
lions, leopards, or murdered in any way. He curses thus : 
" Listen, all ye dead people. I've come. I'm here. Now's 
your chance. Up and kill me, or eat me if you like ; I 
fear none." He then throws red powder on the water, 
which is a fighting challenge to the spirits. The more fish 
he catches the louder his oaths and curses, until he 
eventually hoists his two stone anchors and paddles off 
home with his catch. 



CHAPTER XIX 
Study of Language 

LANGUAGE is said by one to be given us " to 
conceal our thoughts " ; by another it is de- 
J scribed as " a habit of uttering sounds to repre- 
sent ideas " ; and by a third, " a method of conveying our 
thoughts by signs and symbols." As a boy I remember 
witnessing a play called The Dumb Man o j Manchester in 
which the said mute had been witness of a murder and was 
brought into court to give evidence. His dumb descrip- 
tion of the murder and the events leading up to it so 
impressed me visually that I never even thought of it in 
spoken form. Years later, on Lake Mweru in the Congo, I 
remember seeing a crowd of natives held spellbound by a 
deaf and dumb Luban lad who was describing with 
inimitable gesture a journey from which he had just re- 
turned. He spoke by signs for an hour with the most im- 
passioned eloquence, and described mimetically his being 
called up for the journey, his parting from his friends, his 
being given a load to carry, his being scolded for coming 
into camp late, and eventually, amid roars of laughter, he 
demonstrated how he had been laid down and got many 
cuts with the hippo whip because he failed to understand 
what had been expected of him. 

Many theories of the origin of language have existed 
from time immemorial, but I think the onomatopoeic 
theory of language suggests itself as aboriginal, for one finds 
not only a certain number of true onomatopoeias, but a 

i97 



ig8 Study of Language 

clearly defined system in vogue that points conclusively to 
the onomatopoeic origin. Call this the " bow-wow " 
theory of language if you please, as was sneeringly done by 
a learned professor once, but the fact remains and one has 
seen its method of working during an extended and intimate 
study of sixty different African dialects. The story of 
Psammeticus, an Egyptian king, who was curious to find 
out the world's first language, recounts that he cut out the 
tongues of two shepherds, in whose care a child was placed, 
and they were put in a hut removed from human dwellings 
to find out the first word the child would speak. They 
reported that it said bekos, the Greek word for " bread," 
hence the accepted theory that Greek was first spoken. 
A witty Englishman, on hearing this, said : " No, the 
child was only asking for its breakfast ! " 

That man was created with a perfected form of speech 
I do not believe, although I certainly think that mankind 
was created with the speech faculty, the potential gift of 
language, just as he was given arms to work with and legs 
to walk, and that these had to be developed by use. The 
chief raison d'etre of language is, I presume, to make our- 
selves understood and therefore, whether by gesture or 
by audible speech we attain this end, our medium is 
language. 

There is nothing so discouraging and mystifying to 
a beginner desirous of acquiring a working knowledge 
of another tongue than to be confronted, at the outset, 
with a mass of rules such as one finds in most modern 
grammars. Why is it, and how, that an ordinary African, 
brought into contact with European civilisation for the 
first time, picks up a conversational acquaintance with 
any form of English, French, Portuguese, Spanish, and 
even Dutch and German, quicker than we acquire his lingo ? 
I think the main reason behind this phenomenon is that he 



Study of Language 199 



endeavours to learn our language much as a child learns 
to speak. He adopts the natural, the mimetic, method, 
whereas we employ the unnatural, the visualising, method. 
" L'oreille faut la pratique aussi bien que la langue " 
(the ear must have practice as well as the tongue), said a 
great actor and author on one occasion. The man in 
question was a linguistic prodigy, who spoke, wrote, and 
acted fluently in most European languages and several 
Oriental. He might have added — " et Pceil aussi." Ear 
and eye as well as tongue require to be trained. Apropos, 
Emerson says : 

" I heard the throstle sing his song, 
Sitting at dawn on the alder bough. 
I brought him home in his nest at even. 
He sings the song, but it pleases not now, 
For I did not bring home the earth and the sky — 
He sang to my ear, they sang to my eye." 

The psychological methods of sequence adopted and 
taught by Francois Gouin, the Berlitz, and " Methode 
directe " schools in teaching languages I have used again 
and again with marked success. The rule of language 
teaching and acquisition should be : language first, grammar 
after. As a French professor of languages put it : " II 
faut apprendre la grammaire par la langue, et non pas la 
langue par la grammaire " (one must learn grammar 
by means of language and not language by means of 
grammar). 

In each of the world's great speech families, and in their 
subdivisions, we find race characteristics evolved by environ- 
ment and embalmed in language just as we find in different 
dialects, e.g. why does an Englishman speak of " being born 
with a silver spoon in his mouth " ; a Frenchman of 
" being born with hair dressed " ; and an Italian of " being 
born clothed " ; and a German of " being careful in the 



200 Study of Language 

choice of parents " ? The thought is the same in every 
instance, but the mode of expression or idiom is different, 
indicating a pronounced racial characteristic. A negro 
once said to me on comparing African poverty and misery 
with European wealth and comfort, " But, sir, ye are God's 
firstborn," which is the Bantu equivalent to the " silver 
spoon." 

Language rhythm or melody is also an important factor 
with each tribe, and the man who hopes to speak " like a 
native " to natives must master this important item which 
differs with every dialect just as there is said to be a different 
timbre in the vocal chords of each race. I have seen a 
European who was invisible to his hearers mistaken for a 
native owing to his having acquired the native language 
rhythm to such perfection, whereas on the other hand I 
have met men who never lost the rhythm of their own 
patois, and who spoke Bantu with a Scotch, American, or 
Belgian accent. In 1903 I lived with the veteran missionary, 
Dr. Laws, in Nyasaland, for two months. The Staff was 
Scotch and mostly Aberdonian, and the thing that struck 
me in this great Native Institute was that natives who came 
from many different tribes to receive their education, 
adopted a Scotch accent in speaking their own dialects. 
I have seen the same thing on American mission stations 
in Angola, mission boys speaking Umbundu with an 
American twang. This is due to the African's irrepressible 
tendency to use mimetic methods. 

Many of us are acquainted with the mission boy in Africa 
who, when asked by his master a certain word in his language, 
replied, " Is it a verb or a noun, sir ? " The ordinary native 
knows nothing whatever of grammar, and to him a word 
is that which expresses some concrete idea. His system 
of punctuation, too, is vocal and requires a trained ear. It 
is very nice, and even gratifying, to our amour-propre 



Study of Language 201 

to have learnt the whole orthography, etymology, and 
syntax of a language before opening our mouths to speak 
in a foreign tongue, but from a practical point of view it 
is certainly better to put into immediate use whatever 
little we know until we have learnt more. Foreigners do 
not generally laugh at our mistakes, but, as a rule, show a 
sympathetic appreciation of our efforts to use their language. 

Bantu is possibly the most easily learnt and spoken, 
and, being the Italian among the Oriental speech families, 
is the most musical and euphonious. European children 
born in Africa pick up the native dialect long before they 
speak their mother tongue, and during the first years of 
my children's lives my wife and I always spoke to them 
in the native tongue. Bantu languages are more speedily 
acquired than European. A knowledge of any one Bantu 
language provides a key to 276 known languages, which 
represent fifty millions of people inhabiting a third part 
of the African continent. 

In my long and extended studies of comparative Bantu 
languages, there is one thing that has constantly forced 
itself upon my notice, and that is the fact of the self- 
determination of language groups. Each group represents 
a distinct geographical area, and possesses a central or leading 
language around which constellate a circle of cognate 
dialects. 

Between Lobito Bay and Lake Nyasa a definite language 
group boundary meets us approximately every 150 to 200 
miles, viz. : 

1. Between the Quanza River and Catumbella, Um- 
bundu is spoken with a group of patois. 

2. Between the Quanza River and the Kasai River the 
Chokwe language obtains with its patois group. 

3. Between the Kasai and Lufupa Rivers, the Luena 
language is paramount with its dialect group, 



202 Study of Language 

4. Between the Lufupa and Lualaba Rivers a form of 
Lunda is in use with its many dialects. 

5. In Katanga between the Lualaba and Luapula 
Rivers the South Luba language prevails, which has a 
large group of dialects. 

6. Between the Luapula and the Loangwa Rivers, 
Wemba is the commonly accepted medium of speech. 
Wemba has fifteen dialects, viz. Bemba, Bisa, Ushi, Twa, 
Unga, Senga, Lala, Lamba, Lunda, Lungu, Tabwa, 
Shila, Kunda, Wiwa, Nanwanga. 

7. Between the Loangwa River and Lake Nyasa, the 
Ngoni and Chinyanja languages prevail with their dialect 
groups. 

Each of these dialects, taken on an actual average, 
contains a proportion of at least 75 per cent words common 
to the group. 

As a result of Government, Mining, and Commerce, 
there have sprung into existence all over Africa a large 
number of Linguae Francae or trade languages, the three 
leading of which are : 

1. Arabic — Northern Africa. 

2. Swahili — Central Africa. 

3. Kitchen Kaffir — South Africa. 

Again, in every colony or large district of a colony there 
are to be found more circumscribed Linguae Francae, e.g. : 

1 . Chinyanj a — Nyasaland. 

2. Wemba — N.E. Rhodesia. 

3. Sekololo — N.W. Rhodesia. 

4. Tebele — S. Rhodesia. 

5. Umbundu — Angola. 

6. Fiote — Lower Congo. 

7. Chimoyo — Central Congo, 



Study of Language 203 



8. Bangala — Upper Congo. 

9. Kitchen Swahili — Katanga. 
10. Kitchen Hausa — Nigeria. 

White men learning a Bantu language often make 
ridiculous mistakes, some silly, but others more serious, e.g. 
a doctor who had a riding-ox and who wanted his servant 
to fetch it, said, to the amusement of a group of bystanders, 
" I'm an ox," while another man who wanted the native 
name for an axe held up one before a native, saying, " What 
do you call this ? " " What do you say ? " replied the boy ; 
and " What do you say " was entered in the notebook 
as the name for an axe. A lady who was perplexed to find 
that there was no native word for " half " got a potato, 
and cutting it in two held up the half potato in her hand, 
asking her cook-boy the word for " half." " Nacbimona " 
(" I see it ") replied the boy, and " I see it " became her 
word for " half," despite explanations to the contrary. 
In Cust's Book oj Modern Languages oj A jrica we find the 
" Kaya " tribe referred to, " Kaya " being the equivalent 
for " I don't know." In another book on Nyasaland, 
we read of the " Kaya " tree. The white men obviously 
asked the name of the local tribe and of the tree, and were 
answered by the word " Kaya," meaning " I don't know " ; 
hence the mistake. 

To learn a Bantu language is by no means the most 
difficult of tasks if we use the natural method, that which a 
child employs in acquiring its mother tongue. It seems 
incredible, but one can see at any time in Elisabethville, 
a native employed as interpreter between a Belgian and a 
Britisher, neither of whom knows the other's language, 
the medium used being either Kitchen Kaffir or Kitchen 
Swahili. I have seen the same thing in the early days 
between a British and a Belgian official on Lake Mweru, 
and we used to laugh over the joke of a nigger interpreting 



204 Study of Language 



between two Europeans. I am pleased to say that to-day 
most Belgian officials speak English and most English 
officials speak French, and both, to qualify, have to pass an 
examination in a native language, which indicates greater 
care in the choice of men to fill Government posts, and 
higher standards of efficiency. In the old days, Government :; 
billets went a-begging, and any man who was around, 
trading or shooting elephants was sure of a job. To-day,/ 
men are carefully chosen and trained. Whether as Govern- 
ment official, trader, or missionary, a successful career 
in Africa depends, and will in the future more and more 
depend, on a knowledge of the native languages. 

Preconceived ideas of natives and their languages must 
be dropped by us and we must remember that Ajrica is 
a new world, and as the Romans used to say, " Semper 
aliquid novum ex Africa." New tribes and new languages 
are daily coming to light and bringing with them new 
responsibilities to the European. 

Not only the languages, but a knowledge of the Customs, 
Laws, etc., is desirable and essential. The story is told of a 
young Government official appointed to an important 
post in the interior. He had great ideas about giving the 
people " good old British justice," as he called it. When 
he arrived at his post he was waited on by a deputation of 
chiefs, and at the interview he said, " I'm going to kick 
out all your native laws and give you good old British 
justice." One of the chiefs, who was spokesman, replied, 
" Sir, one of our laws forbids a man to marry his own 
sister. Is that law to become null and void ? " Africans 
are not out-and-out fools, nor wholly stupid, nor are all 
their laws altogether bad. 

To become proficient in our knowledge of the natives, 
their customs, laws, and the whole political and social 
system, and so save ourselves and those who succeed us 



Study of Language 205 

endless trouble, worry, and even war, there is one way, and 
that is, to get hold of at least one of the 276 languages of 
Bantuland ; the one spoken in that particular part of the 
continent where one lives. The importance of learning 
at least one native language well is being more and more 

I recognised by European Governments. There are sufficient 
books obtainable on African problems and languages, so 

, that ignorance of the African and his language in this 
twentieth century, instead of being a mark of superior 
civilisation, has become a mark of neglected or defective 
education, and involves, on the part of the European, gross 
culpability. 



CHAPTER XX 



Language & Languages 

THE African language problem is beginning at last 
to find its solution as the result of the conscien- 
tious, plodding studies of men of various nation- 
alities and professions in many parts of the continent. 

The 191 3 Language Map oj Ajrica^ by Bernard Struck, 
shows six linguistic families with languages and dialects, 
as follows : 

1. Semitic.. 10 Languages, 12 dialects 

2. Hamitic . . 47 „ 71 „ including 

3. Hottentot — — 

4. Bantu .... 182 „ 119 „ 

5. Sudanese. . 264 „ 114 „ 

6. Bushman.. 11 ,, 3 „ 

5H 319 
As Hottentot and Bushman are believed to be allied 
genetically to the Hamitic family, only four families 
remain, viz. 

1. Semitic. 

2. Hamitic. 

3. Bantu. 

4. Sudanese (Negro). 

Semitic, to all intents and purposes, means, with the 
possible exception of ancient Ethiopic and Amharic of 
Abyssinia, Arabic, which was introduced from the East 

206 



Language &* Languages 207 

and dates from the Mahommedan invasion between 
a.d. 640 and a.d. 711. Thus we are left with only three 
African families to account for : 

1. Hamitic. 

2. Sudanese (Negro). 

3. Bantu. 

Numerically the Sudanese family preponderates, though 
geographically Bantu represents the greater land area in 
Africa. 

The Bantu family of languages is now known to have 
originated from the fusion of the Hamitic and Sudanese 
elements, which explains their Northern origin and the 
Migration Legend common throughout Bantu Africa. 

A copy of a colossal work on the Comparative Study of 
Bantu and Semi-Bantu Languages (Oxford, 1919), by 
Sir H. H. Johnston, just to hand, shows " Illustrative 
Vocabularies of 276 Bantu and 24 Semi-Bantu languages 
and dialects." These, in the author's words, prove that 
" the political importance of the Bantu languages in the 
future will be as great as the political importance of the 
Indian vernaculars." 

Bantu languages and dialects number approximately 
366 (plus eighty-seven semi-Bantu). The former are 
spoken by fifty millions of negroes. The boundaries 
between languages and dialects have been, until now, more 
or less arbitrary, but these are being gradually determined 
and fixed by the modern crystallising process of the Press. 
In this respect missionaries have been the pioneers, and 
now not only in mission fields, but also in mining and 
industrial centres, native newspapers are being edited, 
printed, and distributed in the vernaculars, under the 
supervision of educated Bantus. In one field where five 
different translations of the New Testament existed, all 



208 Language Languages 

the missionary societies — save one — appointed a repre- 
sentative committee of their best linguists to hammer out 
a " Union Version " to be used by all. This language- 
fixing principle is at work all over Bantu Africa. 

Hitherto each leading language representing a group of 
dialects was that employed by the paramount people of 
the country. Sometimes, as in Nyasaland, the language was 
named after the country, e.g. Chinyanja — the lake-language 
spoken by the people round the Lake. At other times it 
was named after the conquered people if the tribe was 
large and had a history, e.g. Chiluba, used in Katanga prior 
to the advent of Europeans. In Katanga a bastard form 
of Swahili, which was introduced by Arabs, is in use. 
Bemba or Wemba of N.E. Rhodesia bears the hall-mark of 
the warlike Awemba, and is spoken with variations by six- 
teen tribes. Hence their saying, " Awe mukwai, i Chibemba 
chabembakana konse" meaning, " The Bemba language 
has become current all over." The Bemba came originally 
from Lubaland in the Congo, and one finds in their language 
and customs many traces of their Luban origin. The Luba 
language contains many customs and words of purely 
Semitic extraction, e.g. mema, their word for " water." 
This is, excepting the final vowel of the word used for 
euphony, Arabic and Hebrew. Tohu and Tuhu, used inter- 
changeably all over Lubaland, bear the meaning attached to 
the word in the Hebrew story of creation in Genesis i. Tohu 
wa bohu (" without form and void "). From Congoland to 
Nyasaland the name for God is Lesa. This also is of purely 
Semitic origin and corresponds to the Jewish name El- 
Sbaddai ("God Almighty"). So Bene or Bena, which 
means " people of " (Bene Israel= people of Israel). It is 
thus used by the people of Lubaland, Bembaland, and other 
adjacent countries. 

Luba has more dialects than any other language I know. 




An Anthill as a Dwelling. 

Some idea of the enormous amount of work expended by the indefatigable little workers may 
be gathered irom the fact that the mound can be hollowed out to form a substantial dwelling for 

human beings. 



Language Languages 209 

Bemba represents fifteen, all of which have at least 75 
per cent of words exactly alike. One is also struck with the 
variations of rhythm employed, and other peculiarities. 
A nice Swahili speaker invariably lisps. A Bemba man 
uses lallation, and a seemingly excessive use of the letter 
" F," which has given rise to the verb Ku-Fyaula, just as 
in French we use Zezayer of a man who uses " Z " for " S." 

A Sanga man rolls his " R's " like the " Northern 
Farmer." A Henga man uses frequent gutturals and 
aspirates, and a Lunda man seems to be for ever talking 
through his nose. The " social shout " of the " noisy 
negro," complained of by Mary Kingsley, is an outstanding 
feature of all Bantus, and a Congolese native, on returning 
from Belgium, declared that " white men all whispered." 

There are three lengths of vowel- sound, e.g. long, 
medial, and short, found in Bantu vowels, which corre- 
spond to Italian. The difference between " gathering 
grubs for food," " smoking tobacco," and " worshipping 
God," can only be determined by the three lengths of the 
vowel " E." So with the other four vowel sounds. Vowel 
and consonantal harmony is also a feature of Bantu. 
Nasalisation is important, and is seen, among other things, 
in the first person singular of all verbs. In fact, one must, 
without fail, denasalise letters to get to the root-meanings 
of all words. 

The Definite Article in Bantu. The employment of 
the article in Bantu languages has long been considered a 
moot question, though it has been the subject of much 
heated discussion. It is, therefore, with a certain amount 
of reluctance that I write, with a request for patience on 
the part of those who may only be acquainted with one or 
two Bantu dialects, and therefore be over-hasty in pre- 
judging the merits of the case. 

That there are two distinct sections of the one great 
o 



2io Language & Languages 

family of languages marked as Arthrous and Anarthrous 
seems to some of us a fact now beyond dispute. In these 
we have a definite precedent or example in the Latin and 
Greek languages ; the former, like the African division 
represented by Swahili, Nyanja, Yao, Luba, Luvale, and 
many Congo languages, illustrates the Anarthrous Bantu ; 
the latter, which is highly Arthrous, is seen in Zulu, Kaffir, 
Suto, Pondo, Swazi, Herero, and the Mbundu languages 
of Angola, plus Bemba and its dialects. Though the 
modern leading Latin languages, viz. Italian, French, 
Spanish, and Portuguese, possess both the Definite and the 
Indefinite Article in both genders and numbers, we know 
that these have departed from the parent stem, and only 
the modern Greek has retained its pristine purity in respect 
to the article. From analogy it would seem quite con- 
ceivable that Bantu languages should also have undergone 
as a result of attrition or natural development similar 
changes of expansion or contraction and that Bantu should 
be subject to the general philological rules that govern 
other languages, as well also as have a history of its own. 

Now, to look at the North, whence Bantu originally 
sprang, we see that both Hebrew and the Arabic languages 
have no indefinite article, and that the definite article in 
Hebrew — ha-ha and in Arabic el or al — is as in Bantu 
prefixed to the word and is the same in both genders and 
numbers (the difference being that in Hebrew a strong 
daghesh is employed). We can quite understand how that 
by laws of expansion and contraction — and for lack of 
literature — the initial vowel article developed or was 
dropped altogether. That the " classifier " or noun prefix 
of Bantu was originally a noun, first generic, then specific, 
is well known ; that the demonstrative pronoun is also the 
definite article in non-initial- vowel Bantu we have long 
known ; but that this initial or incipient vowel is the 



Language & Languages 2 1 1 

definite article and the characteristic of a division of the 
Bantu languages we only now venture to assert after long 
study of the subject. Whether on the West Coast, in the 
South, up the East Coast, or in the far Interior, there is 
no question as to the existence of the initial- vowel-Bantu 
and non-initial- vowel Bantu as two distinct divisions, and 
that these represent Arthrous and Anarthrous Bantu. 
Looking over a number of Bantu grammars representing 
the philology of East, West, South, and Central Africa, we 
see what writers have to say on the subject of the Article 
in Bantu : 

1. Heli Chatelain, author of a valuable grammar of 
Kimbundu, the language of Angola on the West Coast 
(written in Portuguese), as also the author of other works 
on Bantu, says : " O artigo definido o serve para ambos os 
generos e numeros " (the definite article serves for both 
genders and numbers), " and is seen in the incipient vowel 

of the prefix in the singular and A in the plural." 

2. Padre Ernesto le Comte, R.C. missionary in the 
province of Benguella (Lobito Bay), in his Methodo Partico 
da lingua Bundu, also pronounces the incipient vowel 
element to be a definite article. 

3. F. S. Arnot, who came to the country about forty- 
three years ago, says in his Umbundu grammar (the language 
of Bihe and the trade tongue), "in the case of nouns 
denoting species, the initial O may be regarded as a sort 
of Definite Article." 

4. Dr. Wesley Stover, of Bailundu, Bihe, also writes in 
■ his Umbundu grammar, page n : "The substantive pre- 
j formative consists as we have seen of the derivative prefix 

1 preceded by the Demonstrative Article O which is equiva- 
ent to the generic definite article." 

5. Bishop Steere, in his Swahili handbook, page 4, says : 
' There is nothing corresponding to the English definite 

1 



212 Language Languages 

article, the word when standing alone implying the in- 
definite article, while the definite article can in many cases 
be expressed by the use and arrangement of the pronouns, 
but still must often be left unexpressed." 

Note. — As Nyanja, Yao, Chewa, and other languages 
round Nyasaland and Eastward do not possess the initial 
vowel element it is only natural and appropriate that any 
reference to the existence of a definite article should be 
wanting. 

6. Going South, we find one of the earliest Bantu 
philologists, Rev. J. L. Dohne, writing in his introduction 
to a Zulu-Kaffir dictionary that the " first member initial 
vowel of the incipient element has the force of an Indefinite 
Article." 

7. Dr. Bleek, the father of Comparative Bantu, also 
regards the prefix as consisting of two parts, the first of 
which, the initial vowel, he regards as an article. 

8. So, Father Torrend, who probably knows more 
Bantu languages than any living man, both theoretically 
and orally, in his Xosa- Kaffir grammar, makes two articles, 
one simple or vowel as the initial U in Umfana (" boy ") and 
the consonantal, as M, the other or second part of the 
prefix in Umjana. Also in his larger comparative grammar, 
a colossal work written later, he says : " In Kafir the 
Article both Definite and Indefinite is U, I, or A, according 
as the Classifier following it — expressed or understood — 
contains U, I, or A." Torrend represents our opinion 
entirely as to the Article Definite or Indefinite, and his 
wide knowledge of Bantu makes his opinion of great value. 

On the other hand, Bishop Colenso, Grout, and Berthoud, 
of the Swiss Mission, Delagoa Bay, are all of the opposite 
opinion. 

9. D. Crawford, Luanza, as the result of close study of 
many Bantu languages, both East, West, South, and in 



Language &* Languages 213 

Central Africa, is of opinion that the demonstrative pro- 
noun is the Definite Article in Bantu, and so uses it in his 
valuable translation of the Luba New Testament. As 
there is no incipient vowel in Luba and the Demonstrative 
is undoubtedly so used this rule of the Demonstrative 
supplying the place of the Definite Article certainly 
applies to Luba and those other Bantu languages that do 
not possess the incipient vowel element, or Bantu Definite 
Article. 

Now to come to Bemba, not to speak of the many others 
where the incipient vowel exists which is equal to a definite 
article and is so used — please note, that the incipient vowel 
is in every case the allied vowel of the classifier and is in 
reality an abbreviated demonstrative, e.g. 

U-muntu — the person (Definite). 
A-bantu — the people „ 
Mu-ntu — a person (Indefinite). 
Ba-ntu — people ,, 
Here we have an example of the use of Definite and 
Indefinite Article. 

Uyu is the demonstrative singular and Ava the plural of 
: above class and mean That and Those, thus U yu muntu, 
" that man," and, Ava bantu, " those people," become 
U-muntu — the man. A-bantu — the people. 
Mu-ntu — a man. Ba-ntu — men, people. 

This seems to be the working theory of the abbreviated 
: demonstrative or Definite Article of what may be called 
the Anarthrous Division of the Bantu language. 

A Short Introduction to the Study of a Bantu 
Language 

Any person learning one of the 276 known Bantu lan- 
guages has a key to all. If necessary this could be proved 
jy producing a table of a dozen types of Bantu, including 



214 Language Languages 

Umbundu, Luena, Luba, Bemba, Nyanja, Zulu, Suto, 
Swahili, Luganda, Nyamwesi, besides Congo dialects, if 
space permitted. 

These, however, are easily accessible to those interested 
in African languages. 

There is no question about the inherent simplicity of 
Bantu speech. To learners, however, the chief difficulty 
that exists between Bantu and our own language is found 
in its entire dissimilarity of construction. 

Bantu is an alliterative family of languages and this 
alliteration is seen in the Noun Class system with its 
tendency to govern the various parts of speech. In other 
words, alliteration, or the recurrence of the initial vowel 
throughout the sentence, is its distinguishing feature. 

The wide range of usefulness and potent influence of 
Bantu is becoming daily more apparent to all classes of 
Europeans whose calling in Africa involves contact with 
natives. The hundreds of tribes occupying fully two- 
thirds of the African continent, that part which extends 
from Cape Town, north to the Niger and between the 
Atlantic and the Indian Oceans, use Bantu speech in one 
or other of its forms. 

To show the simplicity of Bantu, take the following 
examples in Bemba, one of an allied group of fifteen dialects 
spoken with local variations and mutually intelligible 
throughout the greater part of Northern Rhodesia and 
the south-east corner of the Congo State. 

WEMBA 

Wemba Alphabet Abbreviated 

The vowels have actually three degrees of length — (i) 
Short ; (2) Medial ; (3) Long, but the ordinary five vowel- 
sounds common to Italian serve for most purposes. 



Language &* Languages 215 



Alike 


u a" 


in 


father 


E „ 


£ a " 




fate 


I „ 


: ' ee 


55 

5? 


feet 


„ ' 


<o" 


?) 


hope 


u „ ' 


c 00 


?? 


foot 



The consonants are almost the same as in English, except 
that C and H are only used in the combination CH for the 
" ch " sound in " Chip." 

G is only used as in Go, never as J. 
S „ ,, ,, ,, So, ,, Z. 
Y „ „ ,, a consonant or semi- vowel, and never 
as in Any. 

N with the nasal mark resembles the first NG in Singing. 
B is sounded slightly like BW, and some prefer a W for 
this un-European sound. It is really a bi-labial V. 

N.B. — Both Bemba and Wemba are written. The other 
letters require no comment in this short article. 

The Noun. — The Noun has nine classes which undergo 
changes according to the initial syllable which, for con- 
venience, is called the Classifier or Prefix. The final and 
unchangeable part is called the Stem. We give the working 
of the Class System in the first three classes, which are the 
most important. 

Class 1. — Sing.: Muntu — a person 

Plur. : Bantu — people 

Class 2. — Sing. : Mutt — a tree 

Plur. : Mitt — trees 

Class 3. — Sing. : Chintu — a thing 

Plur. : Fintu — things 

From the above it will be seen that the noun changes 
in its initial syllable to form its plural number, at the 



2 1 6 Language <!§f Languages 



beginning, and not at the end, of a word, as with us, 
thus : 

Classifier. Stem. English. 

Class I. — Sing. : Mu -ntu a person 

Plur. : Ba -ntu people 

Class 2. — Sing. : Mu -ti a tree 

Plur. : Mi -ti trees 

Class 3. — Sing. : Chi -ntu a thing 

Plur. : Ft -ntu things 

The first is the personal class, and includes all persons 
and personifications, the initial syllable " mu- " being the 
Classifier and " ntu " the Stem. Only the Prefix changes 
from " mu " to " ba," e.g. Muntu, a person ; Bantu, people. 

The second class has the same Classifier in the singular, 
but changes in the plural to " mi," e.g. : 

Mutt — a tree 

Mitt — trees, the Impersonal Class 

The third is the Neuter Class, and embraces all words 
beginning with " chi." These take " fi " in the plural. 
Hence Cbintu, a thing, becomes Fintu, things. 

Pronouns. — The principal pronouns for use with verbs 
are of two kinds, Conjunctive and Disjunctive. 

Conjunctive 
Singular. Plural. 
N—l T u —we 

U — thou Mu — you 

A — he or she Ba — they 

Disjunctive or Emphatic 
Singular. Plural. 
Ine — I Ijwe — we 

Iwe — thou Imwe — you 

Uyu — he or she Aba — they 



Language &? Languages 217 

Then we have the Possessive Pronouns, which require 
the appropriate Sentence Prefix. 

Possessive 

Singular. Plural. 

-A ndi — mine -Esu — our 

-Obe — thine -Enu — your 

-Akwe — his -Abo — their 

Verbs. — Most verbs end in the letter A, and are composed 
of two parts, Root and Stem. Only the Stem Vowel changes, 
e.g. : 



Root. 


Stem. 




End 


-a 


Enda — go 


Mon 


-a 


Mona — see 


let 


-a 


'Leta — cut 


Lim 


-a 


Lima — cultivate 


Ishib 


-a 


Ishiba — know 


Is 


-a 


Isa — come 


Let 


-a 


Leta — bring ^ 



The Verb Stem is equal to the Imperative Singular, e.g. : 
enda — go thou ; ishiba — know thou. Ku, prefixed to the 
Verb Stem, gives the Infinitive, which is also the Verbal 
Noun, e.g. Kwenda — to go ; kuenda — going. 

Herewith three Verb Tenses : 

1. Simple Present Tense, formed by prefixing the 
Conjunctive Pronoun to the Verb. 

Singular. 
Nteta muti — I cut a tree 
Umona muntu — You see a man 
A enda kubomba — He goes to work 

Plural. 

Tulima libala — We dig a field 
Muishiba Jintu — You know things 
Balwa bukali — They fight fiercely 



218 Language Languages 

2. Simple Past Tense, formed by the insertion of " a " 
between the Conjunctive Pronoun and the Verb Stem. 

Singular. 
Nateta muti — I cut a tree 
W amona muntu — You saw a man 
Aenda kubomba — He went to work 

Plural. 

Twalima mabala — We dig fields 
Mwaishiba fintu — You knew things 
Balwa chibi — They fought hard 

3. Simple Future Tense, formed by the insertion of 
the infix particle ka between the Conjunctive Pronoun 
and Verb Stem. 

Singular. 

Nkateta muti — I shall cut a tree 
Ukamona bantu — You shall see people 
Akenda kubomba — He will go to work 

Plural. 

Tukalima libala — We shall dig a field 
Mukaisbiba fintu — You will know things 
Bakalzva bukali — They will fight fiercely 

Adjectives. — These are formed variously, but we shall 
take the simple form and work with a few pure adjectives. 
It will have to be remembered that these have no use apart 
from the noun they qualify ; e.g. : 

Suma — good 

Bi —bad 

Tali — long 

I pi — short 

Nono — little 

Kulu — big 



Language & Languages 219 

Alliteration will be seen in operation in its most elemen- 
tary form here. 

Examples 

Class 1. — Sing.: Muntu Musuma — a good person 
Plur. : Bantu babi — bad people 

Class 2. — Sing. : Muti utali — a high tall tree 
Plur. : Miti ipi — short trees 

Class 3. — Sing. : Chintu chikulu — a big thing 
Plur. : Fintu finono — little things 

In the first and third classes the Classifier is added to the 
Adjective to give them their full value, while in class two 
only the vowel of the Classifier alliterates. 

Again, to show further alliteration, let us take the 
Possessive Pronoun, with Noun and Adjective, e.g. : 
Muntu wandi musuma — My good man 
Bantu bobe babi — Thy bad people 
Muti zuakwe utali — His tall tree 
Miti yesu ifi — Our short trees 

Chintu chenu chinono — Your little thing 
Fintu fyabo fikulu — Their big things 

Note that only the initial vowel alliterates with the 
Possessive Pronoun in the Singular of class one and plural 
of class two. All the others take the full prefix. 

I shall now give a full alliterative sentence to show the 
position of Adjective, Pronoun, Verb, and Noun. 

Singular. 

Muntu wandi musuma ulima, libala 

Man — of me — of good — he digs— a field — English literal 

My good man he cultivates a field translation. 

Plural. 

Bantu bobe babi bateta miti itali 

People — f thee — of bad — they cut — trees — of height English 
Thy bad -people cut tall trees literally. 



220 Language <S§f Languages 

Prepositions. — The almost universally used Prepositions 
are : 

Pa Ku Mu 

and mean : At To In 
e.g. : 

Pa nanda — at the house 

Ku nanda — to the house 

Mu nanda — in the house 

Ali <pa nanda — He is at the house 
Aenda ku nanda — He goes to the house 
Aingila mu nanda — He enters in the house 

These represent the Classifier of the ninth class of Nouns, 
called the Locative Glass, also by suffixing the particle No 
to these three forms, the Adverbs here, hereabout, and 
in here, are built with many others, e.g. : 

Pano — here 
Kuno — hereabout 
Muno— in here 

Ndi pano fa nanda — I am here at the house 
A isa kuno ku nanda — He came here to the house 
B aingila muno mu mushi — They entered into the village 

The most convenient and useful source of Preposition 
is found in what is called the Relative Stem of Verbs. 
This Stem contains every possible Relative Preposition in 
use. It means : for, against, on behalf of, in the name of, 
for the sake of, etc., etc., e.g. : 

Kulwa — to fight 

Kulwila — to fight for 
Kulwila nanda na bana — to fight for home and 

children 
Kwenda — to go 
Kwendela — to go against 



Language & Languages 221 

Kzvendela bantu babi — to go against bad people 

Kuima — to stand 

Kzviminina — to stand up for 

Kwiminina buloloke na chine — to stand up for right- 
eousness and truth 
Kwikala — to sit, to live 
Kwikalila — to live for 

Kwikalila masange — to live for pleasure 

Ku sosa — to speak 
Kusosela — to speak on behalf of 

Kusosela balanda — to speak on behalf of the 

poor 

Ku end a — to go 
Kzvendela — to go in the name of 
Kwendela shikulu — to go in the master's 

name 

Adverbs. — These can be, variously, Prepositions, accord- 
ing to the structure of the sentence. Vide Preposition, 
e.g. : 

Pano — here Afa — there 

Muno — in here U mu — in there 

Palya — yonder 

Mulya — in yonder 

Like the Preposition, so the bulk of Adverbs are made 
from one of the eight Verb Stems, called the Intensive 
Stem, which conveys every adverbial idea of thoroughness 
or intensiveness suggested by the Verb, e.g. : 

Ku lima — to dig 
Kulimishya — to dig thoroughly 
Ku enda — to go 
Kzvendeshya — to go quickly 
Ku teta — to cut 
Kuteteshya — to cut up in bits 



222 Language & Languages 

Ku mona — to see 
Kumoneshya — to see well 
Kuishiba — to know 
Kwishibishya — to know fully 
etc., etc., through all the Verbs. 

Conjunctions. — These are simple and easily learned. 
Na — and, with 
Kabil — also 
Mwandi — but 
Lelo — now, to-day 

e.g.: 

Iwe na Ine tzvaishiba fintu 
You and I we know things. 

Twenda na bantu besu 
We go with our people. 

Kabili alwa na bantu bakwe 

He also fights with or against his people. 

Basosa Chibemba chibi mwandi baishiba bwino 
They speak Bemba badly, but they know it well. 

Interjections.- — These are mostly onomatopoeic, and 
the theory of the origin of Bantu as living speech is that it 
was inter jectional, i.e. all words, nouns, verbs, etc., were 
originally Interjections, of which the Noun Prefixes are 
the only remaining vestiges of proof. 



CHAPTER XXI 



Bantu Literature 

BANTU literature, though so little known, is never- 
theless of paramount importance to an under- 
standing of the races that inhabit Bantuland 
because it furnishes us with the only existing key that can 
open to us the whole arcana of Bantu life and history in 
its fourfold aspect : the Individual, the Family, the Clan, 
and the Tribe. Native doctors, diviners, medicine men, 
musicians, poets, orators, with instructors and instructresses 
of secret societies, guilds, and clubs, or schools, which the 
young boys and girls have to attend, and where instruction 
is liberally given in the science of esoteric anthropology, 
are the recognised repositories of Bantu literature, and it 
is to them we must go in order to learn and record what 
may be gathered on this subject. Circumcision camps for 
boys, and Mbusa temples for girls who have attained 
puberty, are found to be the only places where the young 
folk of Bantuland receive a public education. This educa- 
tion, though primitive and crude, and distinctly immoral 
looked at from the European standpoint, is certainly 
very much better than no education at all. Of all the 
above authorities on Bantu literature the doctor comes first 
and foremost, for practically all the business of life must 
be brought to him and pass through his hands. He is the 
representative of the spirits of the departed and the 
recognised and only medium between the living and the 
dead. The following items have been gleaned from every- 



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Bantu Literature 



day life, and most of them taken down first hand from 
native doctors and diviners. 

Divination over a Sick Child. A man once had a child 
who was sick. The child became dangerously ill. The 
husband called his wife and said to her : " Why is it our 
child is sick like this ? " The wife answered him saying : 
" All that is the doctor's business." The husband rose 
and went off to fetch the doctor. On reaching the doctor's 
house he sat down. He said to the doctor : " Sir, please 
come and divine for me about the sickness of my child." 
The doctor said : " Good, but first give me the initial 
fee." On receiving the initial fee he went at once. They 
then brought him a mat, with which he covered the divining 
instruments. He then began divining and questioning the 
spirits, saying : "If it's you, dead spirit, who have caused 
the sickness of this child, who are you ? Are you the uncle 
after whom the child is named, whose body is in the cold 
ground ? " The spirit answered saying : " Don't mention 
my name, please." The oracle then refused to give further 
answers, so the doctor rapped again, and said : " Is it the 
child's dead grandmother who has caused this sickness ? " 
The oracle again refused, saying : " No, it is the paternal 
grandfather." He says : " Bring me a beer offering and 
decorate my spirit hut." They did so and the divination 
held fast. 

The doctor went out of the house and the woman 
remained with her husband. She said to him : " Have 
you heard what the doctor says, my husband ? Your 
guardian spirit has brought this sickness on the child, so, 
bless us." Then the father turned and said to the sick 
child : " Oh, I'm so sorry, my child, I beg your pardon. 
I bless you," and he spat some beer of blessing all over the 
ground, saying : " That's because I mentioned your 
maternal uncle, that's the reason," and he blessed the child 



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225 



again, squirting beer all over it. Then the doctor came 
and said : " Give me my fees, I have divined. My name 
is the fighter of demons " (kalzaa fibanda). 

Divining Cause of Child's Death. A wife and husband 
live together and a child is born. The child one day 
becomes sick and dies. They mourn. After a few days 
have passed they say : " Call in a diviner." The diviner 
comes and drops into his incantations at once and tells the 
parents the result, thus : " The child in the grave says : 
1 Let father pay up my mother,' " that is to say, let them 
straighten out matters at home between themselves. " If 
father refuses, saying, ' I shall not pay up,' then let 
him get out of our home. If he refuses to get out I will 
come and kill mother." The parents talk together and 
say, " We accept the decision : now there only remains to 
pay mother." The doctor says to the woman, " If finally 
he refuses to do this you must separate." The doctor then 
says, " I have divined, sir," and leaves. 

Divination over Unborn Child. Now when a woman 
becomes pregnant and the pregnancy is far advanced, if on 
the day of giving birth parturition is difficult, those present 
say : " Let's call in the doctor." The doctor comes and 
drops into his divination and gives the " divined-about 
ones " the result. The doctor says, " The cause is due to 
the paternal grandmother," who answered saying, " It is I 
1 who am now being reincarnated," and on saying so the 
divination held fast. The doctor says to the pregnant 
woman : " Tell me everything and keep nothing back." 
She then, to save her life (lest she die in childbirth), con- 
fesses any unfaithfulness and anything wrong she may 
have done, and then says, " I understand that it is the 
paternal grandmother who is coming to be born." The 
doctor then says, " All is right now. I have divined, sirs." 
The woman thereupon commences to give birth, while 



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Bantu Literature 



those present sing : " Come gently, gently out of the 
womb. Oh, my good spirit, we shall make you a present 
of a young chicken that you may follow on nicely." The 
child is safely born and the matter ends. 

Reincarnation and Giving Names. When a woman 
becomes pregnant a public announcement is made. On 
the day of announcement she says to herself : " You must 
avoid being seen in public places now your pregnancy is 
far advanced." They divine and the divination says, " It 
is your brother who died who is coming back to be reborn 
in you." When he is just born she tells those present, 1 
and he receives the dead brother's name. In the womb 
is the place where the name is given. He is accordingly 
called by the dead uncle's name. 

Divination over Impending Abortion. When a woman 
is pregnant and the pregnancy is advanced, and after a 
time the womb prolapses and she becomes very ill, all the 
midwives say : " Let's call in a doctor to find out the 
cause of this illness and womb prolapse." One of the 
mothers present (only mothers are allowed to be present 
at the birth of a child) takes " initial fees " for the doctor 
in her hand and goes to call him. She addresses the doctor 
thus : " Sir, please divine about our sick daughter, for 
since becoming pregnant she has not been strong." The 
doctor goes and carries with him a fetish, and a small pot 
in readiness, and on arrival he says, " Give me a mat that 
I may get on with my divining." They bring him a mat 
and spread it on the ground. He covers the divination 
instruments and spits a blessing all over them. Then he 
divines thus : " If, O dead spirit, you are an uncle who 
has caused this person's sickness, tell us." The oracle 
replies, " No." He continues questioning the departed 
spirit thus : " If you are a brother who has caused this 
sickness, tell us." The oracle answers, " No " (the 



Bantu Literature 



227 



doctor ventriloquises, talking to the spirit), " I called you 
6 father ' in order that you might give me the right 
medicine, not to revile and insult you. Some alternative 
medicines, please. Oh, bless here and get on the top of 
death so that the mother's children shall get on the top 
of the child who shall then descend." (This refers to a 
certain practice adopted by African midwives.) At this 
point the doctor declares, " It is the uncle who is the 
cause, saying, c I shall be born in her who has womb pro- 
lapse. If you spit a blessing on her she will then give birth 
without trouble.' " (Every difficult case of birth is sup- 
posed to be a case of reincarnation.) The doctor then 
finishes and says, " I have divined, sirs." " All right," 
answer those present. Then he says as he leaves, " Come 
out gently from the womb, O good reincarnated spirit. 
We are all your servants and breathe a blessing for your 
recovery." Immediately the child is born it gets its name. 

Queen or King of the Spirit Chiefs. A person falls 
asleep and during the night a demon enters his body. He 
burns up bed and bedding and roars like a lion. He talks 
like a ventriloquist and jumps in the air, catching hold of 
'the roof of the hut. The people gather round and sing : 

" Come and carry my little stool, 
O child of my mother, come. 
They who come from afar like me 
Should be carried pick-a-back." 

Those standing outside the house take up the song. They 
:hen go inside the hut and clothe him. He then comes 
)ut, having taken a new name, saying : "I am Chikonwe. 

have come to put an end to the smallpox and plagues, and 
orbid these to kill any more people." Then he dances 
nd sings all the evening. He then stops his wild dancing, 
nd the people set to work to catch him. They go to the 



228 



Bantu Literature 



forest and set a trap. If he is caught in it he is then 
accepted as a spirit king (he is supposed to be possessed with 
the spirit of a dead chief). They cook chickens for him, 
feast and honour him, and he continues in this profession. 
(Some of these are very clever dancers and have a very large 
repertory of songs and ballads.) 

A Necromancer. It happens that if a man falls asleep 
and dreams that there is a demon at his head and he starts 
up suddenly from sleep he has given proof of his being a 
necromancer. All gather round him in the night. He tells 
them his experiences saying, " I have come from afar, 
please call my medium for me and I'll tell you all things 
that have brought me here. This year you must sprinkle 
offerings of meal round the rocks at the river crossings, also 
offerings of little white beads. Then you shall have good 
rains, and food shall be plentiful throughout the country. 
The rivers shall be in flood and fish shall be plentiful. 
Medium mine, please interpret all these things that have 
brought me here. When I have told them I must go back. 
My name is c the thunderer.' " 

Calling a curse on a Supposed Witch. If a mother 
dies, immediately the children say : " It was a witch that 
killed her." They say also many other ugly things. During 
the night the children gather together and address the spirit 
of their dead mother, saying : " Oh, mother, mother, if you 
have died a natural death lie peaceably in your grave. If 
some one has killed you by witchcraft, don't rest quietly 
but go to the house of that person and kill them also." 
Now when they find some one has died somewhere, they 
say, " Behold, to-day the witch has gone away for ever. 
The tail of the reedbuck has shrivelled up." (Proverb : 
The first tail from the hunt, i.e. more shall be killed.) 
They say, " Don't go and join in the mourning. Our dead 
mother in the ground is venting her anger, saying, ' Be 



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229 



reconciled over my poor body. A pauper's body is a place 
of reconciliation. No ! Hush ! keep quiet and don't go 
to the funeral, children.' " 

Augury of Life and Death and Three Fetishes. 
Suppose a man compounds three little fetishes when a 
terrible plague sweeps over the land. He then takes his 
three fetishes and throws them into his mouth. He lets a 
certain time elapse while the three small fetishes remain in 
his mouth. Should one of these come out against his will 
that is a sign he will die. Should all come out at once then 
he knows he shall live. 

Auguries of the Snake and White and Red Chalk. If 
a man uses a big live snake for fetish purposes, and after 
that a sickness seizes him, he takes red and white chalk and 
holds it out to the snake. If the snake accepts the white 
chalk then he knows he shall live. If it takes the red chalk 
then he knows assuredly that he shall die. 

Experience with a Witch or Wizard. Now when a 
witch goes off to bewitch any one it waits till dark and until 
people are asleep in bed, usually the first watch of the 
night. On arriving at the house of the person it has gone 
to bewitch it climbs on to the roof naked, and then 
jumps down and bursts into the house. The occupant, 
who is asleep, awakes in a fright. He takes a fetish medicine 
and holds it inside his mouth. He grasps and pulls out his 
fetish horn lying at his head and goes outside. On finding 
that the witch has its fetish horn grasped tightly in its 
hand he seizes it at once and puts his own fetish in its 
hand. Then the witch tells him : " You have wronged me 
by putting the fetish medicine into my fingers. I'm not 
a witch." The man says to the witch, " Lead the way to 
your home," but the fetish leads him astray. Then it 
begs the man not to deliver it up to the people. " Don't 
tell that you caught me at witchcraft though you found me 



230 Bantu Literature 

at your hut trying to bewitch you. Now, you are a wise 
man, please take me home and I shall pay you handsomely." 
Then the man leads the way in front and points out the 
witch's house, saying : " It's there you live." The witch 
goes in and brings out goods and cloth and pays him to keep 
quiet. In parting he warns the witch, saying : " Don't 
repeat this business again, I warn you ! " 

Fetish Test for Site of New Village. A chief before 
removing to a new village site first looks out a likely place, 
and makes the usual fetish test with a handful of white 
meal. He lays it on the ground of the proposed site, and 
returns next morning to see if the meal is scattered. If 
the meal is entire this signifies that the spirits are dis- 
pleased and they must not remove there at that time. 
Calling a doctor they say, " Please come and divine for us 
the reason the spirit chiefs are angry." He comes and 
drops into his incantations and tells them the result. Says 
he : " The dead chiefs refuse you permission to remove 
this dry season, but in the coming wet season we shall 
agree." Then the doctor says, " I have divined, sirs ; when 
you confess to a doctor always put your heart into it." 

Initiation of a Hunter. Now a man desirous of being 
a hunter and anxious to receive the initiation drink goes to 
an experienced hunter of the guild, and says : " Sir, I 
want you to initiate me as a hunter." They take him, and 
turning a pot upside down they seat him there with his 
eyes covered. Then they take medicine and burn it in a 
potsherd. They stretch out his arm and lance it in a few 
places and then rub in the burnt medicine. He then takes up 
a bow, and puts an arrow into it, and goes off to the forest. 
He hunts, and seeing a buck shoots it and kills it. He 
returns and calls his " fetish father." The head hunter, 
called " father of the fetish," cuts two pieces of herbs and 
plucks leaves. When he reaches the dead antelope he chews 



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231 



some of the medicine and spits it into the animal's ear and 
on its head. He also blows medicine into its nostrils. Then 
they place the hunter on the carcase and raise him up with 
the little finger. They cut open the animal, take out the 
heart, and give him it to eat. He also eats the fetish 
medicine. Then they give him four taboos : 

(1) Don't eat wild spinach. 

(2) Don't eat potato leaves boiled. 

(3) Don't eat rabbit. 

(4) Avoid your wife each month. 

Then they feed him with other meat and he becomes a 
full-fledged hunter. 

FOLK-LORE 

Brer Rabbit and the Guinea-Fowl Dinner 

The animals went out to hunt one day with the elephant 
at their head. They had no success, and as it was afternoon 
and the chief was hungry they sent one animal after another, 
buffalo, rhino, hippo, etc., but they all came back empty- 
handed. The rabbit came up to the chief and stood on his 
hind legs, saying : " Oh, great chief, send me, and I shall 
bring you eighty guinea-fowl for dinner." The elephant 
laughed and said, " Go, but I know you won't do any better 
than the others." Brer Rabbit hustled off and reached the 
riverside at a spot where guinea-fowl always came to drink. 
He pulled out his penknife and, setting to work, cut a bundle 
of osiers with which he commenced to make a big basket 
trap. He finished by putting a door on the side, which he 
fastened, and went to sleep. The guinea-fowl came along, 
cackle, cackle, and woke him up with their cackling. He 
rubbed his eyes and, looking sleepy, said : " Hullo, you 
guinea-fowl, how do you do, all of you ? " " What is that 
big basket for ? " they asked, " Oh," said the rabbit, " if I 



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Bantu Literature 



were inside that basket all you guinea-fowl couldn't lift me." 
They all laughed and said, " Why, one of us could lift you 
easily." " All right, try," said Brer Rabbit, as he opened 
the door and went inside. They caught the basket and 
tossed him high in the air. " Ah, but," said the rabbit, 
" that's nothing." " Why," said he, " if all you guinea- 
fowl went inside I could lift you up." They laughed, 
saying, " Why, you couldn't lift one of us." " All right, all 
of you just get inside and you shall see." They hopped in- 
side one after the other until all were in, and Brer Rabbit 
quickly pulled out a little string he had kept hidden and 
promptly fastened the door. He then hurried off to the 
elephant, saying : " Come along at once and see. I have 
kept my promise and got you eighty guinea-fowl for dinner." 
The animals all hurried excitedly to the spot, and sure 
enough, there were the eighty guinea-fowl inside Brer 
Rabbit's trap. 

FIVE WEDDING SONGS 

On the Marriage Feast 

" Let's wake up the mill, 
And grind out the meal : 
With Brer Rabbit be kin, 
Who dropped his old skin, 
While working and sweating 
To prepare for the wedding, 
The arrival of guests, 
For the marriage feast." 

Marriage Regrets 

" I strutted and swaggered, 
I ogled and courted him. 
Mother, I married him, 
Married a lion grim. 
Now I am sorry, 
And regret my rash folly." 



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233 



Marital Happiness 

" A monkey-nut root 
Bears baskets of fruit. 
It spreads like a vine, 
Which children entwine. 
It's pretty to see 
Such a family tree." 

On a Bad Husband 

" Let's catch the man 
Who's hard on his wife. 
Let's hammer his head 
Till he's tired of life, 
With heavy sticks 
And stones and bricks, 
Till he learn the lesson 
All good men learn." 

Honour to Mothers-in-Law 

" When you marry a wife, 
See you don't forget 
To honour her mother 
Each day of your life. 
Wherever you go 
True marriage is so." 

The foregoing, with much that appears elsewhere 
throughout the book, will give an average idea of native 
literature, which, if the Bantu peoples knew the art of 
writing and printing, would all be found in book form. 



CHAPTER XXII 



Fetishism &? Medicine 

ONE might preface this chapter by saying that 
fetish rites and ceremonies with their con- 
comitant customs permeate the whole Bantu 
fabric, beginning at infancy, and more often prior to birth. 
The bulk of fetish preparations are preventive and pro- 
phylactic, therefore to neglect to provide these, and to 
consult the oracles in regard to every detail pertaining to 
Death, Life, and Birth, which is frequently a fresh incarna- 
tion, is to expose oneself, or one's child, to the dis- 
pleasure of the departed spirits. These are more to be 
feared now in the disembodied state than before. A person 
may have occupied an infirm, decrepit body while he lived, 
he may have been despised and ignored as a weakling, but 
now that, to use an ordinary Africanism, " death has un- 
bound him " and brought him welcome release, he enters 
a region where his power is unlimited by time and space, 
and where he will be better able to avenge insults on those 
whom he knows will have cause to fear him. \The Bantu 
peoples are pronounced spiritists. From first to second 
childhood they grope in a visionary and illusory world. 
They see spirits at every turning of the path. They know 
that to neglect to take the necessary precautions against 
evils seen and unseen — the unseen being more real and to 
be feared than the seen — is to court disaster, disease, and 
perhaps premature death. There is no chance, no un- 
meaning event. Even the friends of a day that cross the 

234 



Fetishism & Medicine 235 

phantasmagoria of his life have been brought athwart his 
path by invisible beings for unknown reasons. The Bantu 
must consult his priest and doctor in everything, and make 
all possible provision against every contingency that may 
or may not arise. In a word he must cover his family, 
house, property, and person with potent fetishes and 
charms and so reduce life's risks to a minimum. In con- 
nection with all this there are observances imposed by 
circumstance and tradition that render the life of the 
African burdensome and monotonous, nevertheless to 
ensure safety and success all this rigmarole and these 
minute details must be gone through for ever and a 
day. 

Fetishism is based on fear of the unknown and unseen. 
I could tell thrilling stories of three different men who 
each fought a lion single-handed ; of a man who fought 
a mother leopard, having stumbled on her two cubs ; of 
a man who fought a crocodile and killed it, just to show 
that natives are not void of physical courage. Let any of 
these same men hear the rustling of a leaf in the forest at 
night, or see a small snake, or spider of a certain kind in the 
path, or stub his toe, he will turn and run until he sees and 
consults the doctor, who will prepare a fetish to counteract 
the evil influence of the omen met and prevent its re- 
currence. 

Personal Fetishes are of primary and vital importance, 
as these begin at the birth of the baby and ensure it a good 
start in life and luck. These are made as a rule by the 
family doctor, after he by divination and shrewd guess- 
work finds out the baby's potential idiosyncrasies. They 
are compounded and compressed inside the shell of a big 
beetle, or the tiny horn of a very small buck, and tied round 
the neck, arm, leg, or body of the child. They are some- 
times decorated with pretty beads, and a string is passed 



236 Fetishism Medicine 

through for purposes of attaching. Sometimes a few hairs 
from the head of the father and mother are inserted in a 
long blue bead, and a string is passed through it with which 
to tie it round the neck. At various stages of the child's 
life different fetishes are made and worn, and as it grows 
up into boyhood, or maidenhood, and passes through one 
or another of the local clubs, secret societies, or village 
heathen schools (for instruction putposes), fresh fetish 
horns are compounded and worn, and so on through life. 
Every child, boy, girl, man, or woman wears regularly, or 
on occasions, one or more fetishes which are frequently 
removed at night and hung up inside the hut to be donned 
again at sunrise. ^ 

Family Fetishes are provided by the parents, who are 
responsible for the welfare of their families. These are 
obtained from one or other of the local doctors, who first 
diagnoses, ascertaining all the details requisite before 
prescribing, in order to use only the correct ingredients. 

Clan Fetishes also exist, and a very common and much- 
coveted one is the large Mantis called in South Africa the 
Kaffir God (Masombwe). The field- rat clan near the 
Luapula River have such a fetish which is kept sacred in a 
small temple. They have some weird theories about its 
wonderful miracle-working power. 

Tribal Fetishes are kept at the chief's kraal, or in charge 
of a doctor or set of priests who are the repositories, and 
are held responsible. Very often the chief proclaims him- 
self the head doctor, and keeps the tribal fetishes in his 
own care. These are important and give status to the tribe 
according to the virtues with which these fetishes are said 
to be invested. The Ushi tribe in N. Rhodesia have two 
great Ju-jus or oracles, called Makumba and Ngosa, male and 
female. On May 16th, 1907, I visited these far-famed 
deities. They are kept in a small temple about ten feet 



Fetishism &* Medicine 237 

in diameter, where a priestess resides to keep the sacred fire 
burning. There are several priests in charge, and the 
chief priest who consults the oracle is a clever ventriloquist 
and is called Chilaluka. On examination I was surprised to 
find that they were both meteorites of several ounces' 
weight, hence the legend that, like Diana of Ephesus and 
the Kaaba, or " black stone," at Mecca, " they fell from 
heaven." Makumba, the male, was wrapped up in python 
skins with a massive bushy head-dress of white feathers, 
and surrounded by large Mpande shells, which used to 
be the native insignia of chieftainship. These were con- 
sulted by Msidi, Kanyanta, and other powerful chiefs who 
sought counsel and aid. 

The female, called the sister, lies side by side with the 
other, and is also wrapped up in python skins. These 
oracular fetishes, firmly believed to be of miraculous origin, 
have brought their owners much gain, and still more fame, 
and many a legend is current as to their origin and history. 
In the old days when they were carried before the armies, 
victory, they aver, was always sure, with the exception of 
once when the Arab chief Chiwala desecrated the shrine 
and carried off Makumba, stripping him of much wealth. 
These are the great tribal deities in N.E. Rhodesia and the 
heart of the people's religious belief. All natives mention 
their names and answer questions about them with bated 
breath as though it were an act of sacrilege. They are the 
Jupiter Maximus around which constellate the smaller 
deities of clan, family, and individual worship. 

Ubwanga bwilamfya (or " Subjugating Fetish "). This 
is the great War Fetish of the Wemba tribe in N.E. 
Rhodesia. Its receptacle is a small round shallow basket 
about six inches wide. About fifty duiker horns are 
arranged round the outer edge and a large roan antelope 
horn is inserted through the centre. The basket and horns 



238 Fetishism &* Medicine 

are filled with the fetish medicine. A small hole is drilled 
in the middle of the horn of the roan antelope. 

The medicine consists of meal, camwood powder, chalk, 
castor oil, and medicines of various sorts, including a small 
piece of the skull of the famous Lungu warrior chief called 
Chikoke. These are compounded in a village mortar with an 
ordinary native pestle. When Kiti Mukulu and Mwamba, 
the principal Wemba chiefs, wished to send out their 
armies to raid they called into the capital the chiefs and 
the warriors who were to form the raiding parties, and 
these came in, each with his Ilamfya fetish slung across his 
shoulder. In order to ascertain where to go and whether 
they would have success or otherwise, all the doctors were 
set to work to divine. Rods with a spike at each end were 
stuck in the ground a few feet apart in a row. On the 
top spike of each was inserted an Ilamfya fetish, according 
to the number of chiefs going to battle. A kilt of ndibu 
(" seed ") rattles was hung round the fetish, and it was set 
a-spinning. 

A man was brought and laid lengthwise on the ground 
and a hole dug in front of his neck. His throat was then 
cut and the blood gushed out and ran into the hole. The 
priest's assistants then came up one by one, each bringing an 
Ilamfya in his hand which he had taken off the spinning 
rods. Each stooped down and took a handful of warm 
blood, which he sprinkled over the horns in his Ilamfya^ 
pouring some into the roan horn. He then blew into the 
horn, making incantations while the blood bespattered his 
face and body. He then waved the horn backwards and 
forwards, and returning replaced it on the rod stand. All 
the Ilamfyas were then set a-spinning and the doctors 
and chiefs gathered near eagerly watching the spinnings. 
Wherever the Ilamfyas pointed when they stopped spinning 
was taken as an indication that they must make war in that 



Fetishism & Medicine 



239 



direction. After taking all the flowing blood, they pierced 
the eye of the man with the point of the roan's horn. 

Origin of the Ilamfya fetish : Chikoko, a Lungu chief, 
came to attack Mwamba, and Kiti-Mukulu, in the days 
of Kiti-Muluba, nephew of Kana-Besa, the ancestral 
spirit and forefather of the Wemba chiefs and people. He 
was a powerful chief of great repute, but was killed and 
his skull taken, from which the powerful war fetish is 
compounded, having this for its base and origin. In each 
Ilamjya there is a small piece of the skull of this great 
warrior chief. The skull was kept at the Wemba capital, 
where the high priest of the fetish lived. 

The Mzvango, or " war dance song," when warriors dance 
with enemies' heads : 

" These shall never hoe again, 
They are dead and gone below. 
These shall never dig again, 
They are dead and gone for ever. 
Fight with heart and hand, 
Kill and never fear, boys." 

Form of united oration in praise of Wemba paramount 
chief when his warriors return successfully : 

" O great chief, your enemies approach : 
They are up within sight of your guns. 
Their shade makes us chill and cold, 
But the Wemba warrior never runs." 

Farmers' fetishes are tied to the fences of their fields, 
so that anything getting into touch with any connected 
part is held fast until the owner of the field appears. A 
man protects his canoe, house, property, or animals by 
means of fetishes, and he has unbounded belief in their 
power and efficacy. This general belief acts as a great 
deterrent to crime, and it is only when the native loses 



240 



Fetishism &P Medicine 



faith in his religion, and system of fetishes, that theft, 
assault, arson, murder, rape, etc., become frequent and the 
jails are filled. Fetishism and medicine are two distinct 
systems, and are used for the following specified purposes 
and reasons : Fetish comes from the Portuguese word 
Feitico, meaning a superstitious charm or magic medicine. 
For this the Bantu word Bwanga is used, and these charms 
are used exclusively in the practice of the black and white 
art of magic by qualified doctors, or by wizards and im- 
postors. A man who employs fetishes for his own personal 
ends, or to injure or kill an enemy, is guilty of sorcery, 
buloshi, and is punished by death. A qualified fetish doctor 
or wise man, who employs the same system of charms and ! 
magic medicines for the tribal good, is a public benefactor, 
and is so recognised and treated among his tribe. 

The Butwa temples are notorious dens, where witches 
and wizards are made and harboured, but the Society's 
power protects them. They are said to use Vampire Bats 
to eat up and carry away the grain and food from the fields 
of others they wish to injure. They have Bwanga, by means 
of which they induce flocks of these loathsome creatures to 
go at night and destroy certain enemy fields, and carry the 
stolen food to their own bins. They also are said to use 
moles for similar destructive or anti-social purposes. The 
moles are reputed to carry the food from enemies' gardens 
at night, and take it to the food stores of these witches 
and wizards. There also are crocodile doctors, who are 
said to use crocs to destroy personal enemies or enemies of 
those who employ them. These sorcerers are said to cause 
leprosy, pneumonia, twisted neck, and other diseases by 
their magic medicines. Doubtless many of these are 
poisons pure and simple. My wife had a very clever native 
housemaid, who worked hard and earned many pretty 
cloths. Her married sister (who was a Butwa member), 




Musicians. 

A Gourd Piano in Lundaland, played on important occ asions. 



Fetishism & Medicine 241 

with whom she sometimes lived, envied the younger sister 
her dresses, and one day Kalumbwa did not turn up. We 
were called to see her ; she was dying with what the natives 
call " twisted neck " — her neck was stiff and all awry. 

All said that her elder sister poisoned her, and she cer- 
tainly showed every symptom of death by some powerful 
poison. I remember a similar case on the Luapula when a 
native sergeant died. He was said to have been poisoned 
by a Government headman who publicly expressed jealousy 
of the other's position. I visited the dying man, who 
showed every symptom of poisoning. The poisonous plant 
grew near the station, and I had a cowherd who attempted 
suicide by means of the juice of the same plant. We saved 
him by emetics. 

Smallpox, chicken pox, sleeping sickness, dysentery, 
malarial fever, tick fever, enlarged spleen, venereal dis- 
eases, and many others are well known and have specific 
names. Ghifufya, or " sulphate of copper," scraped off 
the copper stones and mixed with water and a native 
medicine in a snail shell, and painted on with a feather, 
is much used for sloughing ulcers, and fever sores. Trans- 
fusion of chicken's blood is used for a dying person. I 
remember sending back a piece of calico to bury a native 
boy I left dying at my place ; instead I returned to find 
him well. He recovered as the result of an old doctress's 
treatment of the aforementioned kind. I knew a Butwa 
doctor, named Kasenga, who was a chief where I lived 
for years, who used to use a lizard split down the back, 
and put against the spleen, where several incisions had 
previously been made to reduce the painful and swollen 
organ. He had also many other cures, including one for 
insanity, and was sent for from all over the country. One of 
the most common forms of treatment for nearly everything 
is bleeding and cupping. For headaches, fever, pneumonia, 

Q 



242 Fetishism &* Medicine 

pleurisy, and even for painful ulcers, cupping is resorted 
to. Animal horns are procured, cut off near the point, and 
perforated at the blind end. Wax is put over the hole 
and then pierced to allow of suction. If the cupping is to 
be done over the temples, behind the ear, or on the head, 
the place is first shaved clean of all hair. A few incisions 
are then made while the cupping horn is soaked in water, 
and when the blood is flowing gently the horn is put 
over the place, and sucked until the blood flows. When 
the blood is flowing gently the wax is pressed over the hole 
to close it, leaving the horn drawing blood. When the 
horn is full it is removed and the wound is wiped clean. In 
smallpox, chicken pox, and some forms of venereal disease, 
the patient is segregated, and lives in a hut or camp some 
distance from the village. 

Prior to the advent of Europeans, inoculation was prac- 
tised for smallpox. A person coming from a clean, healthy 
stock — sometimes they would go back three generations 
to make sure — was taken, and the lymph from his pustules 
used to inoculate healthy people. During an epidemic I 
had all my personal and house boys thus inoculated. They 
were then kept in the segregation camps until recovered, 
when they were shaved and washed, their old clothes 
burned, and new ones given to them, after which they 
were allowed to return to the village. I have never seen 
a case of blackwater fever among natives, though it is 
common among Europeans, and often fatal. 

The recuperative power of natives is wonderful. I 
remember a man who, the mission doctor said, would die 
if not operated on. The man refused to have his leg taken 
off, and the doctor sent him off with a shake of the head, 
saying : " I give you five days to live." Some months after, 
on visiting the village the man came from, he was found 
quite well, and busy at work. 



Fetishism & Medicine 243 

The fetish doctor goes to the bush regularly to replenish 
his supplies of leaves, barks, roots, etc., from which he 
makes up his stock-in-trade of medicines for use. Aperients, 
astringents, aromatics, soporifics, etc., are well known, and 
many other medicines whose name and action and locality 
are kept secret from laymen. Much is done along the lines 
of " faith healing," and a patient usually enquires about 
the doctor's credentials before putting his case into his 
hands for treatment. Much of the treatment and many 
of the remedies savour of the ridiculous, but one has only 
to read Mark Twain's " literary fossil " on medicine to 
see how we ourselves are not so very far removed in point 
of time from the practices of Africa. How long is it since 
people in Europe spoke of the doctor as the " Leech," 
and accepted without question any nostrums he cared to 
prescribe ? 

One of the favourite and fashionable Love Charms 
worn by native women to enable them to gain the affection 
of a man is made from the hair of an albino. The hair is 
obtained from albinos when they have their hair cut, and 
is inserted in the inside of a hollow blue bead which is tied 
round the top of the head with a cord at a rakish angle. 
If the albino is old the hair is valueless. I know an albino 
woman who does a roaring trade with her hair, which she 
sells at so much per strand. Another love charm is a herbal 
medicine (mutt) sold by women doctors to women who 
want to make certain men fall in love with them. This 
is mixed in the water they bathe in, and is also supposed 
to be an unfailing remedy to cure a husband who is running 
after other women, and makes him fall in love again with 
his own wife. 



CHAPTER XXIII 



Theology &* Religion 

THAT the Bantu races are above all things supremely 
religious is seen in the thousands of priests, spirit 
huts and temples, idols and fetish horns, religious 
objects and new moon services, folk-songs and bush ballads, 
exogamic, totemistic, and taboo rites, associated with almost 
every detail that concerns the individual, family, clan, and 
tribal life of the people. Though fetishism and demon- 
ology are two great and important factors in Bantu religion 
there is also a definite and defined theology. The never- 
ending cry of the Moslem that " God is great " finds its 
echo from end to end of Bantuland. He is called " the 
Great Great One," meaning great in point of person, work, 
and age ; for the three meanings are implied in the same 
adjective. We find that He may be praised, prayed to, 
sinned against, appeased, and His help sought in time of 
trouble and difficulty, though of course for lack of a litera- 
ture as we know it their ideas of God are more nebulous 
than ours. 

As there is no meaningless event to the negro, so there 
is no word or name in any of the five hundred and more 
Bantu languages void of authentic meaning. Each word 
and name has a specific etymology as well as a current 
local significance, and nowhere is this feature more in 
evidence than in the many names, general and particular, 
used to designate the deity. I shall point out a few of the 
various names in use for God, and known to me, after 

244 



Theology Religion 245 

which I think the reader will readily admit that the Bantu 
races, if not theologically inclined to-day, had certainly a 
theological past. 

Among the Ovimbundu tribe of Bihe in Angola the name 
for God is Suku. In that language usuke means " poverty," 
osuke, " a poor person." Uku sukila, suka means " to be 
poor or in need," and Suku, " God, He who supplies the 
needs of His creatures." Njambi-Kalunga, " God," among 
the Cokwe, Luena, and Lunda tribes ; Kalunga, " the other 
world," sometimes the unknown ; and the full title signi- 
fies " the God of the unknown," which was the ancient 
Greek name for the deity. They also call Him Sakatanga, 
"the father creator who created all countries"; sa, "father," 
ka is an honorific prefix, and tanga is the verb " to create." 
The Balomotwa and Katanga tribes called Him, among 
other names, Shakapanga upanga no kupangulula, which 
means " the father creator who creates and uncreates " ; 
referring to creation and death, i.e. uncreation or bodily 
dissolution ; the constructive and destructive theory of 
the deity. The Lubans call Him Kafula mova ilunga wa 
visera, meaning, " He of many suns, the Eternal God 
(ancient of days), the bearer of burdens." Another Luban 
name is W amaneme, " the sorrowful or suffering one." 
(This is no missionary importation.) Another Luban name 
still for God is Vidie Mukulu, " the great king," and they 
frequently address the deity, or even a powerful chief, as 
Lesa Mukulu, meaning, " Oh, great God ! " 

Before getting to the widely used word current between 
Congoland and Nyasaland for God, Lesa, I should like to 
suggest a definition of Mulungu, used in East Africa, from 
which the Swahili form Muungu is abbreviated and 
Arabised owing to coast influence. Mulungu, I suggest, 
means " The Righteous One," as the root verb Lunga, with 
its modifications in many Bantu languages, means " to be 



246 Theology ®P Religion 

right, straight, righteous." The change of the final vowel 
— a to u — is the personal vowel, and the prefix mu is the 
form of derivative personal nouns. This relates to the 
Jehovah Tssaddek of Hebrew. Lunga, Lungika, etc., also 
means " to arrange, straighten, beautify," so that the idea 
of the God of order and beauty is contained in this East 
Coast word for God. 

Now to come to Lesa or Leza, the most widely used word 
for God, and one in use between the Kasai River in the 
Congo and Lake Nyasa, I think we shall trace in it a word 
of distinctly Semitic origin, which, with other Semitic 
words and usages, proves that the Bantus were at one time 
in touch with and influenced by the Semitic civilisation of 
North Africa. Lesa is the causative form of the verb Lela, 
" to nurse or cherish." The root syllable is le and un- 
changeable, whereas the causative suffix, sa, undergoes 
quite a lot of changes, according as the idea is causative, 
relative, frequentative, intensive, etc. Le or It, with its 
variations di and ri, is the invariable form of the defective 
verb " to be " in Bantu, which would suggest the Jehovah 
idea of God, the great I AM of the Jews. Le contains the 
root idea of a mother nurse, and one hears a lullaby used 
to hush the babies wherein " Mother nurses baby for God." 
Lesa means also the nurse, and this is a play on the Lesa 
name for God and the root verb " to nurse." Now what 
is the Hebrew name for God Almighty — El Shaddai — if 
not the Bantu Lesa ? and as a vowel may precede or follow 
its consonant the le therefore gives us el, which is both 
Arabic and Hebrew for God. Sbadd is the Hebrew word 
for " the breast," so that, in short, the El Shaddai of 
Hebrew, " the God of the breast," i.e. the great mother 
nurse, is nothing more or less than the Lesa or Leza of the 
Bantus of Central Africa ; not mere " Mother of God " 
idea, but " God Mother," 



Theology & Religion 247 

Anything great and terrible conveys the real Bantu idea 
of God, and one need have no hesitation (spite of certain 
authorities) about accepting the Zulu word for God, 
Nkulukulu, as meaning " the Great Great One and Old 
Old One," referring to both His Eternal existence and His 
greatness. Pe is another very important root word and 
contains : 

(1) The idea of Eternal, never ending. Pe, " eternal, 

ever, always." 

(2) The idea of spirit and spirit world. Pepo, " wind, 

spirit, etc." 

(3) The idea of breath, breathe. Pema, " to breathe." 

(4) The idea of wind. Pepo, " wind." 

(5) The idea of spiriting or talking to the unseen, from 

which comes its use in " praying to and worship- 
ping God," pepa. 

These correspond in many ways to the Hebrew ruach and 
the Greek pneuma, with their verbs and derivatives. 

" God thunders and God lightens," is a regular wet season 
expression, and they speak of God descending on the wings 
of the wind and in fire. When a person dies they say : 
" Lesa amulya" meaning God has eaten him up or taken 
him to Himself, and Imfwa lesa means " a natural or God- 
death " (as against bewitching). 

They have a little song they sing about God, the lizard, 
and the frog. The lizard plays on the dulcimer and sings : 

" I shall sing a song of praise to God. 
Strike the chords oj the piano. 
God who gives us all good things. 
Strike the chords oj the piano. 
Wives, and wealth, and wisdom. 
Strike the chords oj the piano." 

The frog speaks. " Quiet," says the frog, " God doesn't 
hear the singing of an animal with a tail like you. Go and 



248 Theology & Religion 

dock your tail." God thereupon descends with a rush on 
the wings of the wind and enquires : " Who was that I 
heard singing that pretty song ? " " Croak ! Croak ! 
Croak ! It was I," says the frog. " No," says God, " that 
was not the voice I heard singing." Then the lizard 
replies : " It was I." " Play and sing the words over again," 
says God. The lizard plays and sings as before : 

" I shall sing a song of praise to God. 
Strikejthe chordsioj the piano" etc. 

" Ah, yes," said God, " that was the music and the song 
I heard," and God gave the lizard all the beautiful colours 
of life, and left the frog with nothing but his ugly bloated 
face and his hoarse, rasping, croaky voice. 

Natives not only pray to and praise God for success in 
the business of life, such as hunting, farming, trading, etc., 
but I have heard them say, " God has given me a good 
wife and many children." When they narrowly escape an 
accident or death they invariably say, " God rescued me." 

They also pray to God when they worship at their 
primitive altars and spirit huts. A typical prayer : " Oh 
my God, if you are on friendly terms with the good spirits 
of the departed, help me, save me, and grant me a peaceful, 
quiet life in this world." They are very much given to 
sending messages to the other world by people who are 
dying, and many of these I have recorded, with dates, 
names, and places. When a good man dies they say, " He 
has gone and will plead my cause with God " ; " he shall 
speak for me to thelgood spirits of my departed friends " ; 
and often add, " and tell them I, too, am coming over 
soon," etc. Offerings of meal, beer, produce, and live 
stock, and even human beings used to be sacrificed to the 
good spirits, and God, as thanksgiving for a successful 
war, harvest, or success in any department of life, and often 
to propitiate or appease them. 



Theology Religion 249 

Africans have holy days when a native will religiously 
refuse to go to work or to leave his village to do anything 
on any pretext whatsoever. 

At the new moon, or on a heavy fall of hail, or during a 
period of plague, or mourning, or famine, or war, or any 
terrible event, all ordinary natural laws are suspended and 
in abeyance, and no person dare leave his home or village 
without incurring the severe displeasure of the Spirits and 
of his fellows. 

The Bantu people are very strong in their views about 
blood sanctiflcation, and I have seen this carried out on 
many occasions. In the old days slaves were frequently 
used for this purpose. I remember being present at the 
inheriting and coronation of Msidi's elder brother. The 
throats of several goats were cut, and the blood as it spurted 
warm was caught on a switch of animal tails, and every- 
thing, animate and inanimate, was sprinkled. Not only 
guns, furniture, stock, etc., but all slaves and wives were 
duly sanctified by the sprinkling of blood. As I stood 
watching the blood-sprinkling ceremony the old warrior 
chief Mukembe who was Master of Ceremonies — and 
who has shed more human blood than any African I 
know — quaintly remarked in cryptic speech that, if it were 
not for the white man present, his big, broad-bladed spear 
would pierce many human hearts. As he said it, he gave 
me a cunning look and measured about nine inches of sharp 
steel spear with his fingers for the benefit of those present, 
who quite understood its significance. 

The last war-drum made on the Luapula was made to 
my order to be used as a school bell, and cost many pounds. 
Chipampaula said when he finished it and handed it over 
to me, " Ah, sir, this is the only drum I have made when 
a slave's throat was not cut and the blood used to paint the 
drum." 



250 Theology {§P Religion 

A chief's grave used to be plastered with sacrificial human 
blood, and blood was employed for sacrificial and sanctifica- 
tion purposes in connection with worship and religious 
services. 

Blood is used at least in four distinct ways : 

(1) In blood friendship. 

(2) In blood sanctification. 

(3) In blood redemption. 

(4) In blood feuds. 

Blood friendship was a thing without which, fifty years 
ago, no chief would permit a European to pass through his 
country. It consisted in making an incision in the arms of 
the two prospective friends, mixing the blood from the arm 
of each in native beer, which each had to drink to seal the 
friendship. Blood feuds were common until recently. I 
remember a man asking for Government permission to blot 
out a whole family because one member of it had killed a 
blood-relation of his own. Redemption by the shedding 
of blood was also common. The threat " I shall take his 
blood " was equivalent to " I shall take his life." 

There is abundant evidence obtainable about the Bantu 
belief in the doctrine of immortality and that the soul 
after death goes to God. When a man dies they say, Waya 
kuli Lesa, " He has gone to God." After a brief interval 
they say, Wafika kale, " He has arrived," death being a 
journey. Some say, Lesa wamwpoka, " God has received 
or taken him." The little grain and other offerings that 
one sees on the graves of departed Bantus are, they say, " to 
enable the defunct to buy fire, or light, from God," 
Kushita mulilo kuli Lesa. 

One hears natives calling each other " the sons of God." 
The great leader and founder of the Wemba nation of 
N.E. Rhodesia was called " the Son of God." One sees 



Theology &* Religion 251 

from this and previous remarks on the God name that the 
Bemba people think of God not only as a creator, fierce and 
implacable, but also as a universal father, and His people 
bana ba Lesa, " the children of God." 

Natives are given to using oaths of many kinds, and in 
early days native commissioners utilised these and their 
sanctity to swear men in court and get them to be serious 
and tell the truth. " By my dead father and mother who 
have gone West." " By the gun that took my brother's 
life." " By the sharp knife that cut my uncle's ears off." 
" By the graves of our dead." " By the spirit world." 
" By Hell." " By God." " As true as God sees me." 
" Cut my throat and I won't lie " (with finger drawn 
diagonally across neck). " By the smallpox." " By the 
sleeping sickness." " As true as God hears us." " May 
God strike me dead," and many more. 

" God is there," says a native, pointing upwards. 
Always in speaking of the place where God dwells and in 
their folk-songs they speak of God as " coming down." 
The Amazulu (or Zulus) means " the people of the skies." 
They declare that " the stars are the eyes of the dead look- 
ing down on the world where they once lived and taking 
an interest in all." There is a legend that " the sun and 
the moon had one mother and the mother died, and on 
the way to the funeral they quarrelled and the sun threw 
handfuls of mud at the moon, which are represented by 
the moon's spots. The evening star is the moon's wife 
because she follows behind the moon. The evening star, 
by feeding the moon with only a little food, is the cause of 
its smallness (new moon). The morning star gives the 
moon, her husband, plenty to eat, hence his increased size 
(full moon)." The native has a wholesome fear of spirits 
and fetish medicines. To primitive races nature is an un- 
solvable problem, it is appalling ! He is in continual dread 



252 Theology & Religion 

of the presence of dangers he does not know, cannot 
measure, and hence is powerless to guard against. He has 
intelligence to believe more and fear more than brute beasts. 
Just as the Apostle Paul said to the Athenians, " Sirs, I 
perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious, 77 or as the 
Greek word puts it, " too reverent to the demons," so it is 
to-day among Bantus. What applied to the Greeks of St. 
Paul's time applies with a hundredfold more force to the 
Bantu races of Bantuland : Too Superstitious. 



CHAPTER XXIV 



Arabs {§f Islam 

TO speak of Arabs and Islam in Central Africa is to 
be misunderstood if the reader has in his mind 
men of the type of Saladin or Abd el Kadir — men 
who were scholars and soldiers and who possessed the noblest 
traits of humanity ; or mosques with great glittering 
domes and minarets which shimmer in the bright African 
sunlight, such as are found in Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli. 
The Arab slave traders of Central Africa — with the excep- 
tion of a few — have been coast men, usually half-breeds 
born of Arab fathers and slave mothers, while the bulk of 
Arab personnel were men who attached themselves to them 
from religious and mercenary motives. We call them 
Swahilis, men of the Sawahil or coast. These, as a rule, 
were ex-slaves who had obtained their freedom by excelling 
in cruelty to their one-time slave brothers and sisters during 
village raids far inland or en route to the coast with caravans. 
The mosques we find in the interior of Africa are similar 
to the mission village schools, built of mud and poles, and 
kept in repair by the local natives. In these the faithful 
gather for daily prayer, and there once a week on Friday — 
the Moslem Sunday — a few lessons are read from the prayer 
book and a sermon is given by the Mallim with frequent 
quotations from well-known parts of the Koran. 

Arabs have lived and traded along the East Coast of 
Africa for more than a thousand years, though, until the 
sixteenth century, they never travelled far inland. From 

253 



254 Arabs &* Islam 

then the lucrative slave trade to provide boys for eunuchs 
and girls for concubines to fill the harems of Egypt, Arabia, 
Persia, and even India, attracted increasing numbers of 
ships to the East Coast, and some of the more daring of 
these traders went inland with armed caravans, and founded 
trading colonies in prosperous centres such as Uganda, 
Tanganyika, Rhodesia, and the Congo. In journeys from 
the West to the East Coast of Africa I have met Arab 
traders everywhere, Angola, the Congo State, North 
Rhodesia, and Nyasaland. Wherever they went they had 
an ever obvious twofold primary object, viz. to establish 
Islam and foster the slave trade, and all " in the name of 
God the Merciful, the Omnipotent," etc. The irony of 
it reminds one of European nations who not so long ago 
were engaged in the same slave trade, buying and selling 
men, women, and children for work on cotton, coffee, and 
cocoa plantations : " By the grace of God." I have met 
many Arabs and known not a few personally, and I have 
ever found them hospitable, courteous, and entertaining, 
and it was only when the question of the slave trade came 
up that bitter words resulted and hard things would be 
said. It certainly was a relief to meet and mingle for a few 
days occasionally with well-dressed, clean, polite Arabs, 
after living, month in, month out, with dirty, degraded, 
undressed, devil-worshipping Bantus. 

In 1903 I met Jumbe of Kotakota. He was one of the 
greatest Arabs of Nyasaland, and he kindly evacuated his 
own house for me, provided bed and food, and entertained 
me with proverbial Arab hospitality during the week I 
spent there. I visited the mosques and schools, of which 
there were several, and there on his baraza of an evening, 
with his great men and himself, we discussed the " palmy 
old days " before missionaries and Government officials 
appeared on the scene, tolling the death knell of departing, 



Arabs & Islam 255 

never-to-return slavery and Arab dominion. It was there 
I met the local magistrate, my old friend, Mr. Alfred J. 
Swann, whose thrilling book, Fighting the Slave-hunters oj 
Central A frica, is well worth reading. On his verandah 
we compared notes and had long reminiscent chats of the 
early days and life on Tanganyika, and about his experiences 
with Tipu Tib and the great gentleman Arab, Rumaliza. 
I stayed a few days on my way East that same year (1903) 
with Abdullah Ibn Suleiman at his town in N.E. Rhodesia, 
near Lake Mweru. He was one of Tipu Tib's clique who 
had the good sense to recognise the jorce majeure and to 
avoid raising a gun against the British officers of N.E. 
Rhodesia. Luckily, he was in the administrative district 
of a man who knew Arabs and spoke Swahili fluently. 
He is the only Arab chief that remains to-day in N.E. 
Rhodesia. Selim Ibn Raschid and a number of lesser 
Arabs I have met again and again on my frequent peregrin- 
ations up and down the Luapula River. These came into 
Rhodesia from German East Africa and settled as traders 
near my home at Johnston Falls. Their repeated gun- 
powder and gun-running into the Congo, and their general 
disregard for British laws, led to their eventual expulsion. 
Teleka and Muruturuia I met at the south end of Tangan- 
yika twenty-six years ago, and I can still remember the 
heads stuck on poles around Teleka's walled town. As 
we had to cross Tanganyika in a steel Government boat 
Teleka supplied us with a crew of Arab sailors, who took 
us over to Abercorn. We were three days in getting across, 
and as the boat was full of ivory, which rolled about, 
and had no keel, caught as we were in one of Tanganyika's 
typical storms, we lost control and it nearly cost us our lives. 
The " us " refers to the Government official Mr. Knight, 
Fred S. Arnot, and myself. 

Between Mweru and Tanganyika lakes there used to be 



256 Arabs & Islam 



half a dozen tembe, or walled towns, occupied and utilised 
by Arabs and Arabised Bantus engaged in the slave trade. 
These were loopholed and bastioned, with look-out loopholed 
towers at intervals round the town. In my journeyings 
I used to sleep in these. The houses of the principal 
Arabs were usually fitted with massive, beautifully carved 
arabesque doors, the envy of all Europeans. Many a plucky, 
hard fight has been put up by Arabs inside these walled 
towns. One of the greatest Arab wars in these parts was 
that fought round Karonga on Lake Nyasa against three 
Arab chiefs in three strategically built walled towns. 
Sir H. H. Johnston, Capt. Lugard, and other now notable 
men, besides traders and missionaries, helped in the struggle, 
which was one for the supremacy of Europeans, or Arabs, 
in Nyasaland and Northern Rhodesia. They were defeated, 
and the head Arab, Mlozi, was hanged. Karonga was the 
door to Rhodesia and through it poured the Arab hordes, 
who fed the interior Arabs and native chiefs with guns and 
gunpowder, while they in return sent out great and regular 
gangs of slaves which, with ivory, formed the currency. 

At the north end of Mweru there lived several Arabs, 
including Kafindo and Palangwa. On Kilwa Island at 
the south end of the lake lived Simba (the lion) in a stone- 
walled town, the only stone wall I ever saw in Central Africa. 
On the mainland lived his lieutenant, Sename, a Rugaruga, 
and the terror of the district of North Katanga. Frequently 
polite messages used to reach us at Luanza to say that 
" Simba and his men were coming along on a visit to cut 
our throats," Arab fashion, ku Chinja, as poor Emin Pasha 
was treated by an Arab called Kibonge about the same 
time. This same Arab, Simba, fought the Belgians twice 
and repulsed them with heavy losses. Later, as remarked 
on in Early Days oj North-East Rhodesia, the British 
magistrate at Kalunguisi, at Simba's invitation, went across 



Arabs Islam 257 

and hoisted the British flag, so that Kilwa Island is not 
Belgian to-day, but British territory. Simba's end was 
tragic. He who had prepared and meted out death to so 
many was destined to end his own life by his own hand. 
While directing work in his rice field one day, turning, his 
revolver went off accidentally and he fell dead, the bullet 
going through a vital spot. Natives declared the white 
men killed him by their magic. 

Another old Arab I knew well was Chiwala away up the 
Luapula. He had a very large walled town, and with his 
rascally lieutenant, Chipembere, devastated the countries 
far and near for slaves and ivory. His town was in the 
Congo and he was visited twice by Belgian officers and 
pressed to take the flag. He refused, and instead attacked 
the State forces, chased them, and plundered their tents 
and goods. These Arabs were well armed, being supplied 
with arms and ammunition by the Portuguese at Tette, 
on the Zambesi. They also had two cannon, which they 
used, and which were taken later by the Belgians. Captains 
Brasseur and Verdickt, with an artillery officer, and a big 
force, attacked Chiwala, who fought hard, and at the 
beginning of the fight Capt. Brasseur was killed by a bullet 
from Chipembere. He was shot from a bastion at 300 yards, 
on seeing which Verdickt, one of the bravest of men, sounded 
the charge and took the town by storm. The fight was 
fierce and bloody, and many of the leading Arabs escaped, 
including Chiwala and Chipembere. The latter, who is 
alive to-day, is chief of a big village in N. Rhodesia, near 
Ndola, but old Chiwala is dead. I saw him several times 
at Ndola before he died, and the last time found him lying 
on his angarib, or bed. He was quite blind. " -Kwaheri 
Chiwala^ tutaonana tena. Mwenyiezi Muungu akurehemia " 
(" Good-bye, Chiwala ; please God we shall meet again. 
May God have mercy on you "), were almost my last words 

R 



258 Arabs &* Islam 



to him, to which he replied : " Kwaheri Bwana zoangu, rafiki 
yangu" ("Good-bye, my master, my friend"). Twenty 
slave boys and girls were handed over to my care on Capt. 
Verdickt's return from the fight at Chiwala. Some of these 
are grown up and married and have families and come along 
to visit me from time to time with little presents in memory 
of kindness in the old slave days. The State army that 
fought Chiwala was composed of cannibals, and as they 
passed my house at Mwena they were laden with bags 
slung over their shoulders and on their backs, from which 
projected arms, pieces of legs, and other parts of bodies 
on which they were feasting. They had been feasting on 
human flesh of the killed all the way back, the report of 
which struck terror into the hearts of the natives along 
the N.E. Rhodesian border. 

Unlike the Biheans of Angola, the Arabs usually settled 
down beside some powerful or small chief, and made a 
trading centre. There they traded, and when ivory and 
slaves were sufficient they sent off caravans to the coast, 
which brought back guns and powder and other trade goods. 
After a time of peaceful penetration, having ingratiated 
themselves with the people, and having built a walled 
village, the armed Arabs one peaceful morning would 
attack their erstwhile hosts and friends, killing their men 
and carrying off women and children. Other villages 
around, seeing the futility of fighting such strong foes, 
would, " to save their heads," as they put it, carry ivory 
and slaves to them and obtain whatever peace terms 
the Arabs cared to impose. It had to be peace at any price. 
From then on raids in the more distant villages were the 
order of the day, while the locals, turned into Arab servants, 
shared in the plunder. Thus mushroom Arab kingdoms 
were brought into being and built up throughout Central 
Africa. I said to Chipembere one day: "Look here, 



Arabs & Islam 259 

Chipembere, how many human beings have you killed 
with your own hands ? Hundreds ? " — thinking I had hit 
the mark. He laughed a deep, sepulchral laugh as he said 
from his throat : " No, Bwana. Thousands, not hundreds." 
If rumour be true, his estimate is a by no means exaggerated 
one. Tipu Tib and Rumaliza were the two most powerful 
Arabs in Central Africa. The father of Tipu Tib was 
Hamad Ibn Mohamad, a half-breed Arab of Zanzibar, 
while his mother was a full-blooded interior slave from 
Tanganyika. His name, Tipu Tib, meant " whistling 
bullets," from the large amount of shooting that took 
place wherever he went. Rumaliza means the " finisher 
off." He usually finished off everything, leaving only 
empty villages. He was a pure Arab, reputed a gentleman 
in manner, quiet, courteous, and even cultured. He saved 
the lives of Europeans again and again because he would not 
condescend to bandit laws. He and Tipu Tib helped 
missionaries and travellers times without number, and but 
for their help Stanley and his party would have perished 
on the upper reaches of the Congo. Tipu Tib first entered 
the Manyema country and the West in 1877, the same year 
as Stanley crossed Africa from Zanzibar to the Congo 
mouth. The Upper Congo was at one time an Arab state 
under Tipu Tib and his armies ; or perhaps I should say 
his armed trading forces. When Stanley reached the 
Congo he found Tipu Tib and his Arabs in power, so that 
he required their help, which they gave at a big price. 
Nevertheless, they gave it. It is true that out of 600 porters 
sent by the Arabs to help Stanley, 200 deserted. The 
Arab chiefs, however, could not (as Swann points out) 
be fairly blamed for either Major Bartelott's death or any 
failure of the expedition, as Stanley later blames Tipu Tib 
and them. At any rate, willy-nilly, Stanley virtually made 
Tipu Tib temporary governor of the Congo State, with a 



260 Arabs &* Islam 



salary of ^3000 a year. When later on he sent forces to 
occupy the country, the Arabs naturally resented their 
coming and this resulted in what was called " the Arab 
war." This was brought to a successful termination by 
Capt. Dhanis (afterwards Baron Dhanis) and the hordes 
of Arab soldiers were taken without delay and incorporated 
into the new State army to be composed of Moslem 
Swahilis and cannibal Batetelas, a force of some 17,000 men. 

What kind of chicken came out of this egg we shall see 
later. Sometimes, as natives say, snakes and crocodiles 
as well as birds are hatched from eggs, and this time the 
egg produced a brood of snakes. Meanwhile, the old 
lingo of Chimoyo we all spoke died, and Swahili as a lingua 
franca took its place. White men learned it, natives in 
far-away districts picked it up, and it became the Esperanto 
of the Congo State. At a poste on the Kasai River, in 
1894, owing to some grievance of, I believe, an Arab 
woman, plus corporal punishment meted out to soldiers 
for serious offences which under Arab dominion had been 
ignored, the Moslem Swahili soldiers revolted and were 
later joined by the cannibal Batetela. This resulted in a 
serious mutiny in which over thirty Belgian officers lost 
their lives, one of whom, Capt. Bellen, was a personal 
friend of my own. These revolters went from poste to 
poste burning buildings, killing whites, and taking all 
arms and ammunition found. They razed town after town 
to the ground and destroyed the inhabitants, settling 
for a long time on the Lualaba River. Cannibalism became 
rampant and the terrible stories that reached our ears 
at Luanza where I lived have been depicted for English 
readers in sufficiently lurid colours by Crawford, and may 
be read in his book. Batta, an old Batetela soldier, was 
one of the worst type of cannibals. He would catch a 
woman on the road, kill her, cut her up, and bring her 



Arabs Islam 261 



home for consumption in his hut. He it was who carried 
his own baby up to the Commandant one day, saying : " Sir, 
I haven't tasted baby beef since I left my own country. 
I want permission to eat my baby." After years and years 
of big districts being devastated by Moslem and cannibal 
revolted soldiers, during which our own lives were more 
than once threatened, Major Malfeyt, with strong State 
forces, drove them back in battle after battle, further and 
further towards Angola, until finally they made their last 
stand and eventually capitulated on the Luburi River. 
Thus ended the military mutiny chapter of the Congo, 
which was essentially due to Arabs and Islam, and which 
cost the lives of so many brave Belgian officers. 

Arab power in Central Africa has been broken. Congo- 
land, Rhodesia, and Nyasaland are now for ever free from 
the menace and possible domination of Moslem Arabs. 
The Arabs we have known who swaggered, turbanned, 
in their white kanzus, dangling silver swords and jewelled 
revolvers and daggers, the rulers of the land, their only 
boast that " the gun is king," have now become absorbed 
and are now almost quite unrecognisable. One hears 
that they make good engine-drivers and stokers. I met one 
such on a Katanga train not long ago. We talked of the 
old days before the iron horse began to spin his iron web 
from east to west and north to south. He could only say 
like many another of his ilk, with a sigh for the old golden 
days, " Ah ! Bzuana zvangu, tumeshindwa" ("Alas, master, 
we are beaten "). 



CHAPTER XXV 



The Story of the Katanga 

Past 

BY an apt philological coincidence, the Katanga 
signifies in local parlance the leading country, and 
the aborigines who, from time almost immemorial, 
have lived among and worked the copper hills are called the 
Ba-Sanga, which means " the discoverers." Where they 
came from originally, and when they first discovered this 
rich copper country, would doubtless, if traceable, take us 
back to a date coeval with the Bantu migration. The 
earliest local history locates them where they are to-day. 
All that is known of the Katanga prior to about fifty years 
ago is found in the language, legends, and camp fire litera- 
ture of the tribal inhabitants, and the stories of a few 
travellers and traders. For over a century Katanga was 
known to the Arabs and Portuguese and current legend 
avers that many of the early kings of Uganda were buried 
in copper coffins made from Katanga copper. 

In 1886 Arnot wrote that " The Arabs have been long 
in communication with the c Garenganze ' country, known 
as Katanga, famous all over Eastern Africa for its copper 
and salt. Caravans come from Lake Tanganyika and the 
north for copper to supply the markets of Uganda."* 

* See A. J. Swann's Fighting the Slave Hunters in Central Africa. Mr. 
Grohun explains the name " Tanganyika " as embodying a legend of a 
copper trader from Tanga (Katunga), who found a spring which native 
tradition held sacred, and by interfering with it caused it to burst its 
bounds and become a lake. 

262 



The Story of the Katanga 263 

Copper hoes were in continuous and universal use until 
about thirty-five years ago, when they commenced to be 
replaced by iron hoes which were manufactured by the 
Lubans, and the Ushi tribe on the east side of the Luapula 
River. It is believed that certain families possessed the 
lost art of copper-hardening but that the secret of 
this art died with them ; Arnot in his book, Garenganze, 
1886, says: "The copper mines are wrought and the 
copper smelted out of the ore by certain families. This 
business is handed down from father to son and the in- 
structions of the forefathers are followed with the greatest 
accuracy. At one place the copper is cast in the form of a 
capital H, and the angles of this figure are perfect. At 
other times it is cast in the form of a Maltese Cross, the 
mould being made in the sand by the workers with their 
fingers ; and out of twenty casts from such moulds scarcely 
one-eighth of an inch difference is discernible. The 
malachite from which the copper is extracted is found in 
large quantities on the tops of bare rugged hills. In their 
search for it the natives dig little round shafts seldom deeper 
than fifteen to twenty feet." (A friend of mine who was 
manager at the Star of the Congo mine tells me there are 
native shafts eighty feet deep to water level). " They have 
no lateral v workings, but when one shaft becomes too deep 
for them they leave it and open another." These words 
were written over thirty-five years ago when the Katanga 
native copper trade was in progress. Traders from Uganda, 
Stanley Falls, Angola, the Zambesi, and Zanzibar, as well 
as Nyasaland, met and mixed in this great Central African 
copper market. Again Arnot says : " At Msidi's capital 
I have met with native traders from Uganda, the Unyam- 
wezi country, the Ungala to the east of Tanganyika, the 
Luba country as far down as Stanley Falls, the basin of the 
Zambesi, £umbu, Bihe, and Angola, as well as Arabs 



264 The Story of the Katanga 

from Lake Nyasa and Zanzibar. Copper, salt, ivory, and 
slaves, are the chief articles of commerce. In exchange 
for these Msidi purchases flint-lock guns, powder, cloth, 
and beads, besides many other curious things that these 
natives and Arab traders bring. It is, indeed, quite an 
entertainment when Msidi opens out his stores and exhibits 
his treasures, in doing which he seems to take a peculiar 
pleasure. His collection contains tins of meat unopened, 
musical boxes, concertinas, guns, and pistols, all kinds of 
opera glasses, scientific instruments (generally out of order), 
trinkets of every imaginable description, watches, and 
jewellery ; also cast-off clothing, varying in quality and 
colour from the sombre blue of the London policeman's 
uniform to the gorgeous dress of some Portuguese governor." 
Copper axes, spears, knives, beads, with copper wire of 
many gauges besides ornaments, rings, and decorations 
for powder horns, belts, etc., show but a few of the many 
uses to which Katanga copper was put. 

Everywhere all through these countries just referred to, 
any and all of the above forms of manufactured copper 
were used as a currency in travelling. I have used them on 
several journeys from Katanga to Angola, and vice versa, 
otherwise travelling would have been both difficult and 
expensive. Although the Katanga of to-day comprises a 
congeries of tribes whose origin, languages, and customs 
are allied and similar, the people who claim undisputed 
aboriginal rights are the Ba-Sanga. Their principal chief 
is Mpande, whose capital, thirty years ago, lay alongside the 
site of the present Kambove mine. They were famous 
elephant hunters, and Mutwila, the brother of Mpande, 
again and again brought down his three bull elephants 
per diem. Elephants were once so plentiful in the vicinity 
that at one hunt on the Lufira near Sampwe two hundred 
elephants were killed in a few days. 




Matiemvo, the Great Chief of 
Lake Mwene Chief, Katanga. Lund aland. 

Head-dress Style, Bantu Woman. Congoman with Two Horn Fetishes 

Hanging down in Front. 



The Story of the Katanga 265 

Buffalo in thousands and nearly every kind of game used 
to roam the Katanga plains until 1892, when, after Msidi's 
death, the rinderpest swept over the land and exterminated 
the larger fauna save elephant. When I lived at the Lufoi 
River the game was so tame around there that they used 
to come up to the front of the house where I lived. I 
have sat on the verandah of the house and watched herds 
of game feeding all round. The plains there used also to 
be black with buffalo and most kinds of game. 

Next to Mpande in importance were two other large 
chiefs. Mutwila, Mpande's brother, who stockaded himself 
on an island on the Lufira and defied the State forces under 
Captain Brasseur, though he was eventually driven out and 
was pacified. Mulowanyama (whose name means the game 
wizard) was a veritable modern Nimrod who lived in the 
caves towards the Lualaba West, into which he was driven 
and killed by a strong State force under Lieut. Froment. 
Froment was also killed in the attack at the cave's mouth. 
For previous offences against Msidi Mulowanyama had his 
ears cropped off by order of the chief for insolence, and 
this insult he never forgave. For this he hated Msidi and 
his tribe, the Ba-Yeke, with a fierce, implacable hatred. 
The last time I saw him was twenty-five or more years ago, 
when I remember he wore a turban to cover the disfigure- 
ment. 

The Ba-Sanga are surrounded by a number of other 
tribes whose language and customs are akin. I refer here 
to the administrative area of the Katanga. Southwards as 
far as the British boundary at Ndola live the Balamba, 
whose three principal chiefs are Katete, Ntenke, and 
Dilanda. This tribe was under tribute to Msidi, who 
periodically raided the villages to keep up his supply of 
slaves for the East and West Coast markets. Part of the 
Balala and Baushi tribes live round the south bend of the 



266 The Story of the Katanga 

Luapula River. Eastwards towards the Luapula River live 
the Batembwe and Bashila tribes ; the latter, a fishing folk, 
are the originators of the great secret society called Butwa, 
already described. North-east, along the western slope of 
the Kundelungu range, live the Balomotwa, a moun- 
taineer tribe, who are great game and honey hunters. They 
cultivate the rich fertile valleys at the mountain foot 
which are enriched by the annual wash of the rainy season 
from the hills. 

Northward lives one of the greatest tribes of Central 
Africa, the Baluba, who are of undoubted Semitic origin. 
The name Baluba means " the lost tribe," and their 
language and customs have many Hebrew affinities. Their 
name for, and idea of, God, with their word for water, 
and people, and many other words and ideas, show their 
Semitic strain. West of, and along the Western Lualaba 
River live the Basamba and the Balunda tribes, whereas 
further south, along the Lualaba on both banks, live the 
Bena-Kaonde, whose full-dress name is Benakaondebamu- 
lundampanda. This Teuton-like tribal name describes the 
origin of the people and has reference to the Tower of Babel 
story. The legend runs : " Away back in the world's 
history our ancestors were occupied in building a great 
tower (chamba) to reach heaven. While they built the 
white ants were at work on their wooden pillars, and down 
they came one after the other. They struggled on, adding 
pillar to pillar, but the white ants were more successful 
than they, and after years of labour, down came their tower, 
leaving them nothing but the long name by which they now 
describe themselves." 

Last and not least in the congeries of tribes that com- 
pose the heterogeneous population of the Katanga, and 
one that has all to do with the past five decades of develop- 
ment, is the Ba-Yeke ? an exotic people from the north end 



The Story of the Katanga 267 

of Tanganyika, and who, under their chief Msidi, founded 
an empire that has held sway for nearly half a century. 
The personal, family, and clan history of this mushroom 
autocrat, where he came from, and how he obtained and 
retained possession of this great tract of rich country reads 
like a chapter from the Spanish conquests of Peru and 
Mexico. 

Msidi was a son of Mwene Kalasa (Lord Kalasa), who 
was a minor chief under Mirambo, the king of the Nyam- 
wezi country on the east side of Tanganyika. His tribe, 
which lived at the north end of the lake, was called the 
Basumbwa. Msidi's father, Kalasa, was a copper trader 
who did business in Uganda and often travelled to the 
East Coast in pursuit of trade. He also made frequent 
journeys to the Katanga, and a close friendship sprang up 
between him and the old chief Mpande. On one occasion 
Msidi, who was Kalasa's second son, made a trip to Katanga 
instead of his father. Mpande had just been attacked by 
bands of marauding Balubas under a powerful chief from 
the north who invaded his country. Msidi came to the 
rescue with four guns, a new weapon of war, unheard of 
before, and attacked the Lubans, killing many of them, the 
remainder fleeing home northwards. The old Sanga king 
was so pleased that he decided to reward Msidi handsomely. 
He did so, handing him over large presents of ivory and 
requesting him to return to Katanga as soon as possible. 
Msidi, seeing and seizing every advantage to be derived 
from Mpande's friendship, returned to his home in the 
Nyamwezi country, and after a stay there he started again 
for the Katanga with his wife and children and such 
friends as were willing to follow him. On reaching the 
Katanga again he found that his friend Mpande had grown 
old and feeble, and Msidi promised to remain in the 
country to receive the chieftainship that had been promised 



268 The Story of the Katanga 

him for his help in driving off the Balubas. Shortly after 
this the chief, perceiving that his end was near, gave up to 
Msidi the Omande shell — which answers to a European 
crown — and installed him as chief of the Ba-Sanga. In the 
exercise of his newly acquired power, Msidi put to death 
every one who opposed him, and all who were likely to do 
so, and carried aggressive warfare into all the countries 
adjacent. He defied even the powerful chief Kasembe on 
the eastern bank of the Luapula River, who had formerly 
received tribute from the Sanga chief. Kasembe then 
determined to punish Msidi for his rebellion, and to this 
end he invaded his country. Msidi, however, was successful 
with the help of Angola traders from Bihe in resisting 
Kazembe and asserting his independence. He next added 
to his kingdom the Luba country to the north, and en- 
couraged the immigration of refugees from the Lunda 
country who were ready to flee from the oppression of the 
great Mwate Yamve power, now nearly extinct. Thus by 
fair means or otherwise Msidi gathered round him a large 
number of followers, inviting also many of his own tribe 
from the Nyamwezi country to come and join him and 
occupy prominent positions in the new kingdom he had 
thus so recently founded. 

Several Portuguese travellers passed through the Katanga, 
pre-eminent among whom were two naval officers named 
Capello and Ivens, who took the only existing photo of the 
old chief Msidi, which appears in their book, D y Angola ao 
contra costa. They also give a description of the country 
with a few good pictures of game and native life. 

Later, Herr Reichard, a German traveller, reached the 
source of the Lufoi River, overlooking Msidi's capital, but 
he, hearing of Msidi's doings, returned north with his 
caravan. About 1885 Fred Arnot came to the Katanga in 
search of a healthy and suitable mission centre for work. 



The Story of the Katanga 269 

He lived for three years alone with Msidi at the most 
interesting period of the Katanga history — which story 
may be read in his modest narrative called Garenganze 
(publ. Pickering and Inglis), and in his Biography (publ. 
Seeley, Service and Co.). He was relieved by Messrs. C. A. 
Swan and Faulkner ; then came Thomson, Lane, and 
Crawford, after which came three Congo Free State 
expeditions to annex the Katanga on behalf of King 
Leopold and the newly founded State. Previous to this 
Mr. Alfred Sharpe reached the Katanga on a diplomatic 
mission, that failed owing to an Englishman, Captain 
Stairs, in the employ of King Leopold, intercepting the 
letter sent by Msidi to recall Sharpe with the British flag. 

As Katanga had been included in the newly founded 
Congo Free State three expeditions were sent there to 
hoist the State flag, to establish stations, and take over the 
country officially. One expedition was in charge of Captain 
Bia, who died at Ntenke near the present town of Elisabeth- 
ville ; the second was in charge of Capt. Delcommune, 
and the third, from the East Coast, was in charge of Capt. 
Stairs, who accompanied Stanley on his trans-African trip. 
All sorts of pacific measures were tried on Msidi, liberal 
presents and promises, etc., but the old chief repelled all 
attempts at conciliation, and shifted and shuffled until all 
patience was exhausted. At last two officers were despatched 
by Stairs to bring the king to terms, the Marquis de Bon- 
champs and Capt. Bodson, with a body of soldiers. Bodson 
approached Msidi to insist on his accompanying them to 
the head camp ; Msidi made a thrust at the captain with 
a sword, and the captain, seeing treachery, shot Msidi dead 
with his revolver, and was himself shot by Masuka, one of 
the chief's soldiers. Msidi's head was cut off, the blue 
flag with the golden star (le drape au bleu avec V Hoile d'or) 
was hoisted on the hill overlooking Msidi's capital. 



270 The Story of the Katanga 

Capt. Bodson was buried with military honours, and a 
mountain peak near there (Bunkeya) commemorates his 
name (le pic Bodson). Thus ended the coup d'etat of 1892 
by virtue of which the Katanga is to-day a Belgian colony. 

Capt. Legat established the first poste on the Lufoi 
River where I lived. He retired and was succeeded by 
Capts. Brasseur and Verdickt, who later removed the poste 
to Lukafu. Lieuts. Serckel and Delvienne were their under- 
lieutenants and helpers, and did a lot of rough pioneering 
work. As stated earlier, Capt. Brasseur was killed in a fight 
at the Arab town of Chiwala, near to the present Chinama 
on the Luapula River. He was buried by Verdickt and 
Delveux, though the grave would be difficult to find. 
Lieut. Froment was killed at the caves in the fight 
referred to previously. Perhaps one day we shall find 
in the well- laid- out centre of the town of Elisabeth- 
ville une pierre commemoratij to remind the present-day 
dwellers of the Katanga of the three captains B. — Bodson, 
Bia, Brasseur, with Froment and other brave Belgian 
officials who laid down their lives in the early pioneering 
days to open up the country. 

Capt. Van den Broeck and others followed, taking up the 
hoe laid down by Bodson, Bia, and Brasseur, and furrow 
after furrow is being dug up, seeds are being sown of 
mining, commerce, and other industries. Let us hope 
that — whatever the past has been — the Katanga will, in 
the near future, be one of the garden colonies of Central 
Africa — a model of industry, enterprise, and commerce ; 
and, may I add, that along with our civilising efforts the 
missionary enterprise will not be forgotten, and that the 
true foundation of society — the Church of Christ — may 
raise its head high where the old regimes of the past, which 
we have sought to describe throughout the book, have held 
sway from time immemorial. 



The Story of the Katanga 271 

Nearly thirty years have passed since some of us came 
to the Katanga, a Katanga given over to war, bloodshed, 
and the horrors of the slave trade. The fairy wand of 
civilisation has touched and transformed the land and 
people almost beyond our recognition. If those we have 
watched dancing the weird, wild Tomboka war-dance, with 
heads in their hands, or dangling from their mouths or at 
their waists, fresh back from the slaughter of Lubans, 
Lambas, or Sangas, who burned their wizards and witches 
under our eyes and threw their children to the crocs and 
hyenas, could appear among us to-day and see the changes 
that have come over the land of their birth — what would 
they say ? 

Present 

Katanga is still the leading country of Central Africa and 
the Belgian people its modern discoverers and inhabitants. 
The railway known as the C.F.K. (Chemin de fer du 
Katanga) runs through it from the Rhodesian boundary to 
Bukama on the Lualaba River, where steamers ply carrying 
the commerce of the interior : palm oil, nuts, ivory, and 
produce of many kinds, not least being the boat-loads of 
Africa's great asset — workmen for the mines and farms 
under the care of a well-organised, though still young, 
Labour Bureau called locally the B.T.K. In Elisabeth- 
ville, the rising metropolitan town of the Katanga, are to 
be found natives from far-off tribes, including Bangala, 
Azande, Budja, Basoko, and many other cannibal repre- 
sentatives of the Equator, each with their peculiar tribal 
tattooings, styles of hairdressing, and teeth chipping, filing 
and extraction. Many copper mines are being worked, also 
tin mines, gold and diamond mines, with the great coal- 
fields of Sankishia on the Lualaba River, now producing 
large quantities of coal, for which previously the Katanga 



272 The Story of the Katanga 

was dependent on South Africa. A number of towns have 
sprung up along the railway, and there is a fair-sized white 
population of a very miscellaneous and cosmopolitan 
character. 

There are not only Belgians, who naturally preponderate, 
but there is also a proportion of Britishers, Italians, Greeks, 
French, Russians, Spaniards, Portuguese, and Jews from 
many lands. There are Indians, Arabs, Turks, and a 
sprinkling of many different tribes from Capetown to the 
Senegal. Elisabethville is the official centre of the Katanga, 
with Government and mining offices and buildings that 
would do credit to South Africa. It is well laid out in 
streets and avenues with a boulevard, all named after 
notable men, rivers, lakes, and tribes. In the centre of 
the town and not far from each other are the law-courts, 
Government offices, post office, club, theatre, and a Belgian 
and British bank, plus a British Vice-Consulate. 

There are great trading companies such as the S.C.M., 
Societe Commercial et Miniere, the Belgo-Katanga, the 
Mercantile Anversoise, the Intertropical, and a dozen 
others. There are three churches, an American Methodist 
Episcopal Mission, and a cathedral is being built by M. de 
Hemptinne of the Benedictine Fathers, who is Prefet 
Apostolique of the Katanga. There are three European 
and two native hospitals with an adequate medical staff 
and service. There are seven hotels and an unfortunately 
large number of " Bars." There are two weekly papers, 
Vtttoile du Congo and the Efforts de Katanga, and there is 
a daily paper called the Journal du Katanga. All three are 
printed in French with part in English to meet the need 
of the large English-speaking population. The public 
works and mines department have made a network of 
hundreds of miles of good motor roads. The native 
interests are well looked after by a number of intelligent, 



The Story of the Katanga 273 

sympathetic judges and Government officials, and if there 
is any leaning shown towards natives in the law-courts it is 
certainly in the direction of leniency. 

The native problem in the Katanga is now in large 
measure recognised by men at the heads of departments, 
and let us express the hope that the Government's recent 
policy of trying to understand and enter into the perplexing 
and ever-emerging native questions will be rewarded 
with success, so that AjriccCs chiej and permanent assets 
its population, may live contented and peaceful throughout 
the Katanga under the aegis of the Belgian flag. 



CHAPTER XXVI 



Sport &* Travel 

IN 1892 I set out from Benguella on the West Coast 
for my first trip into the interior of Africa with a 
native caravan, and spent my first Christmas alongside 
a slave camp by the Catumbella River. At that camp 
I contracted my earliest malarial fever with a temperature 
of 105 °, and before I reached the Bihe I was taking quinine 
in 3 5-grain doses that made me stagger along the path like 
a drunken man. The use of the daily prophylactic 5-grain 
doses of quinine we all take to-day was then unknown. 

Turning my back on the sea, thirty-five miles from the 
first camping place we crossed the Esupwa Pass through 
the " door of Noah's Ark," as the Biheans call it, and thence, 
climbing all the time for 150 miles, we reached Bihe — a 
white man's land — where I passed my first eighteen months 
in Africa. 

While there, the call from Katanga reached me in the 
form of a pressing letter from the Interior, and as I was the 
only member of the mission eligible and free to go, I 
responded, and turned my face east with a big slave 
caravan which was then on the point of starting. The 
thirty carriers who formed my personal equipment, and 
who, with the wages I gave them, would return laden with 
slaves and ivory, shouldered my travelling household 
in the form of kitchen utensils, clothing, tools, and trade 
goods, and in a few days we had left Bihe behind and 
reached the Quanza River, on the other side of which was 
the terrible " Hungry Country." 

274 



Sport &? Travel 275 

A crowd of natives gathered at the ferry to watch us 
cross and listen to the haggling over canoes and payment. 
I left my headman to settle, and being a good swimmer, 
I decided to swim across. I stripped, dived off the high 
bank, and struck out for the opposite shore. Foolishly, 
however, I forgot that African rivers are dangerously cold 
and that crocodiles abound, until I got fully half-way over, 
when in a flash it dawned on me, and with the thought of 
crocs and the numbness of my body, it was all I could 
do to reach the other bank. Once, in after years, I was 
hunting on the Luapula, when over went my canoe and I 
was plunged into the water with crocs all round me, and 
I had to swim ashore holding my rifle above my head. 

A thousand miles on foot through hostile tribes of 
whose language and customs one was ignorant was a by 
no means enviable experience. This took me three months, 
and we were often held up for days with a gun at our heads 
by some local petty chief, who demanded tribute. We 
had to pay up or fight, for of course this blustering, loud- 
mannered " nobody " was the representative of a " powerful 
somebody " within call of the war drums. Besides, my 
carriers were never tired of quoting the Bantu proverb 
that " A tortoise never climbed on to a tree stump." 
However, with one stop at a hospitable mission station 
we eventually reached Katanga, where I settled pro tern, 
at the Lufoi River, and later joined D. Crawford at Lake 
Mweru. 

Arnot, the pioneer of the Katanga, came back on a 
visit about this time, but his health failed, and I accom- 
panied him to Abercorn on Tanganyika. Returning to 
Lake Mweru from Tanganyika, I got together a caravan 
of a hundred Lubans and made a seven months' journey 
of three thousand miles on foot to Bihe and back to bring 
in provisions and goods which we were in need of. On 



276 Sport ftf Travel 

the way out west and back I was attacked and, with my 
caravan, fired on three times, and one night I remember 
a war party dancing a war dance round our camp, singing : 
" White man, white man, we'll dance to-morrow with 
your head on the end of a spear." I returned from Mweru 
and built a station at Msidi's capital, and after some 
five years in the Katanga I travelled out to the East Coast 
via Nyasaland and had stirring experiences by the way. 
We trekked through countries where the Angoni were at 
war with the Government, and through others in the 
adjoining Portuguese territory, where intertribal warfare 
was in progress, and I had some narrow escapes. But for 
the fact that my men were all armed and accustomed to 
fighting, events might have ended differently, and this 
story remained untold. 

Unexpectedly and without warning we were attacked 
one day by an Impi of Angoni in Portuguese territory. 
My men loaded their guns, charged, and chased the Angoni, 
and as some of them did not return to camp till sundown 
I fear my orders were exceeded. My orders were, unless 
the men were shot at^ not to shoot. The following day we 
were threatened several times by armed raiding parties, 
but got through unscathed until 5 p.m. During the 
morning of that day we rescued sixty-nine fugitive women 
and children, who were pursued by Angoni warriors, and 
whose villages had been burned and most of their men-folk 
speared. But for our timely appearance they would have 
been killed or captured. About 5 p.m. we ran into a 
regiment of Angoni who were returning from the slaughter. 
We could not avoid them. My men were so maddened 
at the sights they had witnessed that they rushed at the 
brutes, gun in hand, and disarmed them. I caught their 
Induna by the throat and held a revolver at his head. 
" You rascal, you have been murdering defenceless women 



Sport &? Travel 277 

and children," I said, and as I did so, a bundle containing 
two severed heads fell at our feet. I told them to hurry 
home and be thankful their lives were spared. I returned 
to my men, who were examining a pile of shields, head- 
dresses, spears, and battle-axes, many being stained with 
blood. I took several loads of these trophies to Blantyre in 
Nyasaland, and several to England as curios. 

The two days following I shall never forget, for the 
whole country seemed to be ablaze. As we passed we saw, 
lying outside the doors of huts in deserted and burned 
villages, large numbers of corpses of men who had been 
speared while trying to escape. The blood was still oozing 
out of the wounds, which were mostly around the heart 
and neck. 

We hurried on for two days more through scenes of 
carnage, and once during the night my own life was 
attempted by two warriors with stabbing spears. One of 
these escaped in the dark, the other was caught at my 
tent door and, but for my intervention, my men would 
have killed him. The following day I was glad to leave the 
rescued women and children at a mission station of the 
Z.I.M. in the Shire Valley and hurry on to Blantyre ; 
thence to the East Coast. 

I went home, married, and returned again to the Katanga 
in 1900, and for years travelled through Angola, the 
Katanga, and Northern Rhodesia, gaining experiences, some 
of which are related in this book. 

On my first trans- African trip I had no tent, but my men 
built a rough hut for me of branches of trees. Sometimes 
if the day's trek was long and the men tired, I occupied 
an old hut in a village, but these were usually full of vermin, 
and one suffered in consequence. I am not likely ever to 
forget an attack of tick fever I got travelling from Nyasa- 
land to the Luapula seventeen years ago, as a result of 



278 Sport &* Travel 

sleeping in native huts. One's style of camp is usually 
determined by tribal notions, and carriers from different 
countries have each their own mode of transport and 
standard weight of load. A West Coast porter travels 
in comfort and builds a daily camp composed of round 
huts. He will carry, plus his food and pots, a box or 
bale of 60 lbs. weight, but will travel no more than 10 to 15 
miles a day. An Interior native usually argues, " I won't 
live in this hut to-morrow, so why should I trouble ? " 
Hence he puts up a shack that, according to a facetious 
native saying, " lets the nose get wet," i.e. covers every 
part when standing but the nose. He carries as light a load 
as possible — 45 lbs. 

An Arab's camp is usually comfortable and roomy 
enough to hold his goods. Swahili boys, like Congo porters, 
will carry from 70 to 80 lbs. weight. I have seen a man 
carry two loads tied together, weighing in all 120 lbs., 
plus food and pots, in order to get the double pay offered 
by the trader. 

A West Coast caravan used to number anything from 
300 to 1000 men, with women and boys, so that the camp 
was more like an organised travelling village. There was 
the master of the caravan with his big flag, and small 
traders each with their private flags. There were camp 
rules and regulations that had to be obeyed, and the Camp 
Crier announced each evening the orders for the following 
day's trek. Caravans travelled as big as possible for pro- 
tection. 

Native paths are mere ruts trodden by men from 
generation to generation. In the Congo, Rhodesia, and 
Nyasaland to-day, wide, well-kept roads have replaced some 
of these, and the usual form of native taxation in the initial 
stage of civilisation is, year by year, a month of road- 
making. 



Sport & Travel 279 

In early days the people who lived by river and lake were 
the most inaccessible and troublesome, but to-day river and 
lake travelling has become popular and these water peoples 
have become important. On Lake Bangweulu in N. 
Rhodesia, a flotilla of over a thousand canoes, with paddlers, 
was commandeered during the late war, and these carried 
war loads along the river from near the railhead at Ndola 
and over the lake through the swamps to Kasama, for the 
use of troops in German East Africa. The best shooting 
and fishing is found along these waterways, and almost any 
day on the West Lualaba you can see from the deck of the 
river steamers herds of hundreds of elephants and buffalo. 
On Lake Bangweulu among the marshes I have actually 
seen herds of thousands of Lechwe antelopes, and have 
brought down three with one shot of my 303 °. 

" Mushroom and elephant " is ringing in my ears as I 
remember my first experience with Jumbo Africanus. 
I left the lakeside with a caravan of meat-hungry boys who 
were smacking their lips in anticipation. We got two- 
thirds of the way across the Mweru-Congo range when a 
boy ran up to me with a large white mushroom in his 
hand, shouting, " Master, you're going to shoot elephant 
to-day." (This particular white mushroom signifies hunter's 
luck with elephants). An hour or so afterwards we ran 
into a small herd of five. I got my old Martini-Henry 
and a handful of cartridges and gingerly stalked His Majesty 
to leeward. I got to within about 25 yards of him when he 
scented me and turned to see what was the matter. I 
fired and wounded him. He charged, and I fired again. 
Remembering the native theory that Jumbo won't climb 
an anthill, I took the hint and did so myself, but in scram- 
bling up it I rolled down to the bottom and sprained my 
ankle (which kept me, later, indoors for six months). 
I got up again, fired a few more shots, to which a native 



2 8o Sport ftf Travel 

added more, and then, staggering from side to side, the 
magnificent brute fell over dead. A few days after there 
was an elephant dance at Luanza, when " mushroom and 
elephant " were the subjects of the song. Native hunters 
danced the " elephant dance " to drum and song with a 
tusk under the arm, going through the antics of a hunted, 
wounded, and dying elephant. One of the songs ran : 

" Elephant spoor is fresh 
Through the new-burnt grass, 
Breaking twigs and leaves 
For the herd to pass." 

I shot my first buffalo at the north end of Lake Bang- 
weulu, Rhodesia, in what is called the " buffalo bush." I 
was travelling from Nyasaland to the Luapula and cut 
through this spot to cross the lake. We came on a herd 
feeding, and as they moved off I shot this one with my new 
303 . I was so surprised to see him drop stone dead with 
one shot that I concluded that buffalo-hunting and its 
dangers had been greatly overrated. I have changed my 
views since, and now know that buffalo is the most dangerous 
four-footed animal in Africa. 

As I required meat to feed over 200 people I determined 
to make my mark on a herd of buffalo whose haunts were 
near the Belgian foste of Kasenga. I spoored them and 
came on the herd. I got to within some 200 yards and 
fired at the biggest, which was standing shoulder on. It 
ran and dropped, while the herd cleared off. I saw it 
fall and knew it must be near. The grass was three feet 
long and I cautiously picked up the blood spoor. I followed, 
looking well in front, but could see nothing at first. Going 
on I saw a long black body lying in the track, its head 
turned towards me and a wicked look in its eye. I grabbed 
my rifle, stuck a spear in the ground to steady my hand, 



Sport &* Travel 281 

and as I did so the brute got up on to its feet, and, swerving 
round at me, charged, roaring, with its head down and tail 
in air. I fired, and it fell with a crash only a few yards 
from where I stood. I followed up the herd, and at about 
half-past five in the evening came on the buffalo in the 
open, with not a tree near. We wanted the meat badly, 
so I crawled up and taking steady aim shot one after another 
of the remaining five. I went over to look at them. The 
animal farthest off was moving, and my native threw two 
spears at it. It was a cow. She jumped to her feet, my 
man bolted, and I was left alone face to face with the 
wounded buffalo and not a single cartridge in my belt or 
gun. She charged, 1 dodged, she hunted me with head 
down, I ran, zigzagging, she after me until I got absolutely 
winded. I was done. I wheeled round and faced her at 
ten yards with empty rifle clubbed. Luckily for me she 
stood. She shook her head and tail and bellowed. I shook 
my head, waved my arm behind, and roared in an attempt 
to imitate the buffalo. How long we faced each other I 
don't know, but I kept moving backwards until I had got a 
little distance away, then I ran. She still stood, and later 
my boys came along with more cartridges from the camp, 
and I gave her the coup de grace. A narrow shave, indeed. 

Three years ago, during a famine on Lake Bangweulu, 
where I lived for many years, people were dying on every 
hand from starvation as the crops had failed. We brought 
many children to the station and fed them there, but in 
the villages the old people and the weak were going to the 
wall. To try and relieve the situation I went out to hunt 
as I had done on two previous occasions during famine. I 
shot some hartebeeste and water-buck and then ran on an 
enormous herd of buffalo (I had hunted the same herd 
before, when, though I followed them for four days, I did 
not even see them). This time I was destined to pay them 



282 Sport &* Travel 

back. I determined to stalk them carefully. I got up 
behind an anthill only a dozen yards from the herd, picked 
out the biggest and nearest, and raised and lowered my 
rifle slowly three times before I fired. The first rolled on 
his back with legs in air and never moved. Then the herd 
stampeded. I shot one, then another, then two with one 
shot (I was using a 400 express rifle, D.B.). I followed on 
and got, in all, eleven. The last was an old bull, who, 
when he fell, was merely stunned. My boys ran up and 
began sticking spears into him. He suddenly woke up, 
wriggled to his feet, and promptly charged us. The boys 
made for the nearest trees. I stood and fired, and it took 
five shots more to finish him. The horns are lying outside 
my house as I write this, a trophy and a reminder of the 
danger of buffalo-hunting. One white man was killed by 
a charging buffalo near that same place, and another I 
knew was charged and tossed on the horns of a buffalo, 
and lay on the plain where the brute left him for a day 
and a half. He was eventually picked up unconscious, and 
never quite recovered from the effects. 

Hippo afford good sport when hunted in the water from 
canoes. On the Chifunabuli, an arm of Lake Bangweulu 
on the west side, I got some natives to join me with canoes 
and went out hippo-hunting in mid-lake. The hippo were 
well out, and we paddled right up to them. We got a few 
shots in as we chased them, the hippo diving under our 
canoes or coming up close to us ; but though we had an 
exciting hunt I did not succeed in killing one, since it is 
difficult to aim straight from a coggly canoe. On the 
Luapula River the natives harpoon them, and I have seen a 
hippo with thirty or more harpoons sticking in his body 
like a giant pin-cushion. 

Hippo are pugnacious, and I have been charged by them 
on Lake Mweru times without number, also on Lakes 



Sport & Travel 283 

Bangweulu and Tanganyika. Once while travelling on a 
little trading steamer that used to ply between Lake 
Mweru and Johnston Falls on the Luapula, on turning a 
bend of the river we came on a big school of hippo. We 
decided to steam up close to the herd and try our luck. We 
got safely in among them and turned off steam to wait for 
a good shot. They were bobbing up all round us and 
grunting, seemingly amused at our coming so near, when 
we felt something we couldn't see bumping the bottom 
of our boat, and lifting the little s.s. Scotia out of the 
water. The captain rushed to the engine to back out 
when suddenly we were lifted again and this time we saw 
the cause, for a big black bull hippo head with jaws open 
came up alongside, scraping the boat's bottom and grab- 
bing the gunwale in its mouth. We snatched a rifle, 
crammed in a cartridge, just in time to fire a bullet down 
his throat, which made him let go and quickly submerge. 
We were glad to get a safe distance between us and Behe- 
moth, and thankfully left them in undisputed possession 
of their favourite pool. 

I once shot a cow-hippo, and as the calf refused to go 
away, I shot it — when cooked it was the most delicious 
meat I ever tasted. I got £5 locally for the hippo head, 
which was a fine specimen. Looking for marrow fat (for 
cooking) in the hippo leg bones, I found none, but after 
going through the other bones I found it in the lower 
part of the mandible. 

Sable, roan, eland, and all the other bigger game I have 
shot, save rhino. A wounded sable is dangerous with his 
long scimitar-shaped horns, and I have known a lion and a 
sable found dead side by side. 



CHAPTER XXVII 



Sport flsP Travel {continued) 

HERE are lions " used to be writ large over one 
of the earliest maps of Africa, and the author 
of Gulliver's Travels, writing later, put it 
rather quaintly, though not without truth : 

" Geographers in Afric's maps, 
With savage deserts filled the gaps, 
And o'er inhospitable downs 
Placed elephants instead of towns." 

Many men tell of having seen lions after a few days' 
residence in the Interior, and our facetious Dutch friend, 

Pete K of Catumbella, returned late one night, quite 

scared, to say that he had seen a white lion which attacked 
him. We all laughed, as it had happened after a pro- 
tracted dinner. I have myself seen only four live lions 
during twenty-nine years, and that on three different 
occasions when we hunted them. I wounded one and 
killed one with strychnine after he had eaten my cook — 
having previously bumped against my bed in my tent 
whilst I was asleep and wakened me. 

At Broken Hill a Mr. Thornton got his hand and arm 
chewed by a lion while he was asleep in his tent, but in 
answer to his cries his boys rushed in and shot it. W. R. 
Johnstone, a Government official at Mpolokoso in North 
Rhodesia, twenty- five years ago, after a fight with Arabs 
who were smashed up and expelled, went out for a shoot 

284 



Sport & Travel 285 



and saw what looked like a herd of eland. This turned out 
to be a troop of five lions. He crawled up and shot them 
one after the other. As he went to examine his luck, a 
lioness which had been only wounded came for him. He 
made for an anthill and climbed up a low tree, dropping 
his rifle as he did so. The lioness climbed after him and 
caught him by the leg and clawed him, trying to drag him 
down. He fought it while his strength lasted, but the 
brute eventually pulled him down and he got into grips 
with it. To save his head, he stuck his arm into the brute's 
mouth. It chewed his fingers and hand, then his arm, 
and mauled him badly all over the body. He eventually 
threw it off and it fell, being badly wounded. He crawled 
over to his rifle, crammed in a cartridge with the other 
hand which was also badly torn, and raising the rifle with 
his torn arm, he levelled it and fired. Both man and 
lioness fell over. His native soldiers were up trees watch- 
ing the struggle, but were afraid to come down. When 
they saw the lioness was dead they descended from their 
perches and went to their master. They bandaged him 
up and carried him in a hammock to Kambole, the L.M.S. 
Station, three days off, but he was so weak from loss of 
blood that he died after the amputation of the arm. 

At Johnston Falls, where I lived many years, a native 
called Kinyanta went into a thicket near by for firewood, 
and did not notice an old lion asleep at the opening. As he 
came out, the lion woke up and sprang on him, clawing his 
head, but being a man of powerful build he got a grip on 
the lion and threw it down, crying aloud for help. The 
villagers came to his aid, and found him on top of the lion. 
They rushed in with their spears and finished it. 

I passed a spot in Bihe years ago where a chase took 
place between a lion and a baboon which cost them both 
their lives. The lion ran the baboon almost to earth, when 



286 Sport &» Travel 

the latter, seeing a big tree in front, jumped, and climbed 
up until it reached the top, where it clung. The lion jumped 
almost simultaneously, but in the spring it missed the 
baboon and landed in the big fork of the tree, where it got 
wedged. Some days after, the local natives were passing 
the tree and saw the dead lion in the tree-fork, and looking 
up they saw the baboon, dead, still clinging and looking 
down. It had died of fright. It is strange that Africans 
should call an old person chikolwe, " big monkey," owing 
to their stooping as they walk. The negro has also his 
views on the simian origin of humanity, and considers the 
baboon as a mere case of atavism. 

A native hunter saw what he thought was an antelope 
and crawled up to shoot it. It turned out to be a leopard, 
which sprang at him. He dropped his gun and, catching the 
leopard in its spring, fell with it, breaking its back in two. 
I met an Arab once who was attacked by a lion, which he 
fought with nothing but a spear, and killed. He showed 
me the marks of the brute's claws on his body. 

When hunting in Uganda, George Grey, one of the 
brothers of Viscount Grey and one of the best of English- 
men, the man who opened up the Katanga, had his 
promising career cut short by Felts Leo A jricanus. 

Lake Bangweulu and its surroundings might well be 
called a hunter ) s paradise, for there is an enormous variety 
of game and great herds of most kinds, besides birds of 
eighty different names, and I have also the names of forty 
different kinds of fishes. There are herds of elephant, 
buffalo, rhino, a small herd of giraffe, eland, sable, roan, 
hartebeeste (three kinds), puku, water-buck, Sititunga, and 
Lechwe in herds of thousands in the marshes of Lungaland 
and Butwaland, round the islands and at the south end of 
the lake. 

While out shooting Lechwe and duck among the swamps 



Sport & Travel 287 

on the Luapula, I witnessed a battle once between two bull 
Lechwe antelopes. A herd of these water-antelopes was 
quietly feeding on the green grass in an open spot among 
the papyrus, and while stalking other Lechwe I came upon 
this lot evidently holding a council of war. All at once 
they scattered and opened up, when two bulls sprang out, 
swerving, bellowing a challenge, dropped their heads and 
charged each other. They backed to a respectable distance, 
and with lowered horns they charged again and again, 
coming on sideways. The loud thud as their heads met 
and the noise of their horns in trying to lock, the scraping 
and tearing of ground as they fought, with the roaring and 
the excitement of the cows was a sight to remember. I 
sat in hiding and watched the battle for what seemed to me 
two hours, then I shot the one Lechwe, and as the other 
would not go away I shot him also. 

The most disgusting and ungentlemanly creatures in all 
Africa are the crocodiles, which are half-fish and half- 
animal. I have again and again known them to crawl into 
canoes and drag natives out, and I have known them to 
catch fishermen who were paddling or fishing and drag 
them into the water. These animals frequent ferry cross- 
ings, where they hide and catch women and children as 
they come to draw water. I have seen one of our caravan- 
men caught and dragged down as he tried to reach our 
boat, and I know many natives who have fought crocs 
and bear the marks of their teeth on their bodies. A white 
man was once caught while swimming, and in sight of his 
friends, who were helpless to save him, was dragged over a 
sandbank in the brute's mouth, and carried off to be eaten. 

Kasambanika, a lad who travelled with me, was caught 
by a crocodile near Chinama's village on the Luapula and 
dragged to the bottom of the river. The brute stowed him 
away under the roots of a submerged tree and left him. 



288 Sport W Travel 

He turned round to look at the boy again and again as he 
swam away. As the boy saw him go off for good, he crawled 
out, got to the surface of the water, and drew himself 
ashore, where he lay torn and bleeding. He has recovered, 
though his chest and back are badly scarred, and he boasts 
a new name as the result, namely, " The man who swam 
the river." Marolela, another boy of mine, was dragged 
out of his canoe by a crocodile and pulled under water. He 
had his hands free, and fought it, making it let go its hold 
by sticking his fingers into its eyes, after which he suc- 
ceeded in reaching his canoe, and crawled back into it. 
He has great ugly teeth-marks on his chest. 

I have shot crocodiles often and never considered a 
cartridge at them wasted. An enormous man-eater which 
I shot had moss on its back and one paw chewed off. This 
is the only crocodile photo I p^> r ess. A monster ! 

I was putting up a cottage of several rooms on Lake 
Mweru some twenty-five years ago, and to be near my 
work I occupied one of the unfinished rooms. The tem- 
porary doors and windows were made of reeds, and though 
the roof was up the ceiling space was open, and so with all 
the other rooms. Leopards frequently came into the other 
rooms, and on one occasion a leopard jumped over my 
head in chasing a chicken. I fired up at it in the dark and 
the bullet went through the roof. 

At another house I occupied a leopard sprang through 
the calico window-frame and, falling over some empty 
tins in the dark, got a fright and jumped out again. My 
cook was chased several evenings while bringing my dinner, 
and was nearly caught by a lion. 

One night I had gone off to sleep and my cook and 
houseboy were sleeping by the fire in the middle of my 
room, when at 2 a.m. I was roused by an unearthly noise 
at the other end of the house, and my boys shouting : " A 



Sport &* Travel 289 

lion, Bwana, a lion in the house." I awoke and jumped 
out of bed, lit a candle, and the boys blew up the fire 
at which we sat crouching. The noises in the other room 
made us nervy. There were intervals of quiet, then the 
tramp and noise was resumed. It was pitch dark, the 
village was some distance away, and the brute could have 
climbed over the partition wall. I felt jumpy, and decided 
that the time for action had come, so grabbing my rifle 
I said to the cook, " I'll open the door and cover you with 
my rifle while you run to the village and call the men." 
I did so successfully, but the noise was renewed, so I decided 
to have a shot at the brute myself. " Goi," I said to my 
houseboy, " hold the lantern over my head and I will go 
out and shoot the lion myself." " Right, sir," he replied, 
so I opened the door and moved cautiously in the direction 
of the lion. I got there with nerves highly strung, and was 
ready to shoot the first thing that showed. To my surprise 
and amusement the lion turned out to be a puppy-dog 
that had got its head inside an empty 4 lb. sugar tin, and 
couldn't get it out ! 

" Monkeys are not qualified to judge forest law suits," 
runs the proverb in Bantuland. They have certainly a 
weird, semi-human appearance, so that we forgive the negro 
when he says " monkeys were once human beings, like us, 
but to escape work they fled into the forest and grew tails." 
Hard pressed, I have shot and cooked monkey for food, but I 
confess I never quite finished that meal. My Belgian 
neighbours used to have a dish of monkey-stew once a 
week, but it was prepared according to the magician's art, 
so that you could not detect the difference between it and 
venison. 

I remember setting out to visit some friends and pay 
my respects to the new baby, and decided to take a present 
of two black monkey-skins. On the way my boy was 



290 Sport <§f Travel 

preparing lunch by the thicket where the black monkeys 
lived, and in the meantime I set out monkey-hunting. 
I shot a fine, big fellow, and the boy proceeded to skin him. 
I started lunch, but hearing a queer noise, turned round, 
and to my horror the monkey, who had only been stunned 
by the bullet, was sitting up and turning over with his 
fingers some inches of the skin the boy had removed to 
examine it. He turned to me with anything but a simian 
expression, with great wide-open human eyes, as much as 
to say, " What are you doing with me ? " Since that most 
gruesome experience I have never shot a monkey. 

Travelling in Angola many years ago, a friend of mine 
went off the path to where a peculiar clicking and laughing 
noise was in progress. Looking over the steep bank of the 
Zambesi River, he saw a great crocodile with its body half 
out of the water looking eagerly up, with his mouth wide 
open, while at the end of the overhanging branch of a 
tree was a monkey who was playfully swinging down 
to the crocodile. Each time he reached the croc, snap 
went the great jaws, and back swung the monkey with 
screeches of laughter and chuckles of delight. 

Famine used to follow quadrennial floods along the 
Luapula River and Lake Bangweulu, so to save the situation 
and to carry the natives through the next hoeing season I 
would take my rifle and shotgun and go out, not for sport, 
but to kill as much as possible. I fed the natives who, 
as a quid fro quo, came and cultivated a hundred acres of 
food that later, during another famine, saved many of their 
lives. My biggest bag was seventeen head of game in one 
day, inclusive of six buffalo. I got seventeen duck with a 
" right and left " the following day on a sandbank, as it 
was evening and they were close together preening their 
feathers for homeward flight. Another day I got eleven 
buffalo, plus hartebeeste and water-buck. Another day again 



Sport & Travel 291 

I got six eland, two hartebeeste, and a reed-buck, and another 
time a bull elephant that had been destroying gardens, and 
two hippos. 

Marabout, stork, flamingoes, with cranes, cormorants, 
and many other kinds of big birds, including the crested 
crane, whose calls and antics when in love have led to the 
popular songs and dances adopted by the " African Butwa 
Musical Association " — a powerful secret society referred 
to elsewhere — widgeon, duck, and teal of many kinds 
abound, besides a variety of geese. I have seen the plains 
black with spur-winged and Egyptian geese during the 
season, and we used to dry, smoke, and salt them. Pigeons 
and partridges of several varieties help the larder in these 
shopless lands. Egrets, kingfishers, ospreys, and bewildering 
flocks of gaudy waterfowl live among the marshes or take 
up their abode in the season on uninhabited and uninhabit- 
able islets at the north end of the lake. I have seen these 
islets white or blue with waterfowl eggs. 

Many native songs are bird songs, or contain allusions 
to bird life or bird characteristics, and all bird names are, 
without exception, onomatopoeic. Owls are looked on as 
birds of ill omen and are called " witches " and " death 
birds." Their cry is " Fwi, Fwi," which is their name, and 
means " Die, Die." Natives are past masters at imitating 
bird-calls, and need no artificial help. I have had them call 
guinea-fowl for me again and again, when they would flock 
to within a few yards of us. I can do so now myself. 

The following are some Bantu bird songs : 

Song of the Hawk 

" Hawk, Hawk, why do you cry ? 
Say, have you lost your mother ? 
Up in the sky, flying, flying, 
There you'll find another." 



292 Sport & Travel 



Song of the little Deserted Village Bird 

" The little bells are ringing, 
And the little babies singing, 
But a tiny bird is calling 
In the village ruins near." 

Song of the Sparrow 

" Oh, you little sparrow 
That sits on the leafy bough, 
Just wait until to-morrow, 
I'm after elephant now." 

Song of the Night-jar 

" Oh, night- jar, Oh, night- jar, 
Come, stretch out your wings. 
Lie low, lie low, just so, just so, 
The night-jar sings." 

Tiger fish is about the best angling one can get in Africa. 
We used to get seven to nine pounders at Johnston Falls. 
He is most destructive and consumes immense quantities 
of young fish in the season. Carp is good eating, and on a 
small inland lake of an evening I have caught as many as 
sixty-eight with my net. Caviare, made from the roes of 
a cod-like fish, and smoked, I have found good eating. I 
used to go out at nights in Africa (as I have done in Scotland 
for mackerel) wrapped up in a mosquito-proof coat and 
with lights in the bows of our canoes, when we got really 
large hauls of fish. The crocodile is the fisherman's enemy, 
and he tears their nets to get at the fish within them. The 
osprey, kingfisher, diver, and otter also account for a few 
fish. 

One of the best and bravest hunters I ever knew bore the 
name of Richter, a well-chosen one, for he was a judge of 
beasts and men, and wore his black robe with dignity. 



Sport &* Travel 293 

He was a gift to me by a Dutch missionary, with the sole 
recommendation that he had held up a hyena until his 
master arrived and shot it, and that he permitted no 
familiarity. From the first day we " hit it off " and struck 
up a friendship that stood the test of years. He was a 
little fellow, stout, with black body, short legs, long ears, 
and curly hair. He was a peculiar mixture of ferocity and 
faithfulness — a bull spaniel, a real hunter's favourite. 
Though he has been dead now nearly fifteen years, the 
natives on the Luapula River still speak of him with respect, 
and not a few white men remember him. Again and again 
I have, even after the lapse of years, to recount anew by 
request to his many native friends and admirers oft-told 
stories of his prowess on the hunting field ; of the buck 
he ran to earth ; of the leopards he worried, of the hyenas 
whose legs he bit as he chased them, and of the lion he 
attacked that killed him. 

I have seen him on more than one occasion jump into 
the Luapula River, which is several hundred yards wide, 
full of crocodiles. Once he swam the river three times after 
a wounded buck, drove it on to a sandspit and fought it 
for over an hour until we came to the rescue with a canoe. 
An attack on a troop of baboons once on the Koni Hills 
nearly cost him his life. He returned to me torn and bleed- 
ing, but with head up and tail wagging. 

Only twice did I ever see him turn away from animals, 
once on reaching a buffalo, and the second time after hunting 
a porcupine. The latter experience I don't think he ever 
forgot, for the quills were stuck all over him, and he looked 
like a pin-cushion. 

One evening at about 8 o'clock a leopard sprang at his 
mate, Katie, a yellow wolf-dog, and bit her badly. It 
would possibly have killed her, but for Richter, who came 
for it and caught it by the under- jaw. True to the bull, 



294 Sport &* Travel 

he held on while the leopard howled, helpless. It was 
pitch dark, but my hunter boy came up with a grass torch, 
by means of which I saw Richter and the leopard in grips. 
I fired, and bowled the leopard over, when Richter let 
go the brute, who was then hors de combat. The skin and 
skull with the dog's teeth-marks adorn a corner of my 
father's sanctum. 

The lion that killed the plucky dog at last was prowling 
around our house for something human, and my chum 
used to declare that Richter saved one of our lives. 



TO AN OLD RIFLE. 

" You're worn in the barrel, you're gone in the stock, 
Your sights are deceptive and battered askew, 
You're foul in the breech and you're crank in the lock, 
Yet I love you far more than I loved you when new ! 
I've done a fair quotum of stalking and shooting, old 
rifle, with you." 

C. G. 



CHAPTER XXVIII 



Early Days of North-East Rhodesia 

THIRTY-FIVE odd years ago when A. J. Swann 
wandered round Tanganyika getting chiefs' sig- 
natures to treaties and helping to establish a 
British hold round the Lake, the country was a no-man's 
land. Arabs, east and west, north and south, dominated 
the situation and these supplied the Wemba, Ngoni, and 
other warlike tribes with guns and gunpowder, by means 
of which for many years they preyed on each other and 
resisted foreign interference. 

The earliest reliable local history tells that about the 
year 1730 the first Kazembe (Kanyimbe) came from Lunda- 
land in the West and established himself, and people, 
among the Bisa and Senga tribes. In 1796 Pereira, a Portu- 
guese traveller, visited Kazembe and about the same time 
the original Wemba leaders crossed from Ngwenas in the 
Kola country on the Eastern Lualaba River in Lubaland 
and settled in what was then known as Lunguland. In 
1798 Dr. Lacerda, another Portuguese traveller, visited 
Kazembe-Lukwesa, and in 1802 Pombeiros visited Kazembe- 
Chireka. Again, in 1831-32 Monteiro and Gamitto, two 
other Portuguese, also visited Kazembe, whose name was 
Kapumba, son of Chireka. In 1853 another Portuguese 
visited Kazembe, and about 1856 the Arab, Ibn Saleh, 
came to Kazembe's country, who was called Chinyanta, 
son of Chireka, who later was succeeded by Lukwesa, 
also a son of Chireka. In 1862, Muonga, another son of 

295 



296 Early Days of North-East Rhodesia 

Chireka by a slave woman, expelled Lukwesa, and in 
1867 L)r. Livingstone visited Kazembe while en route from 
Tanganyika to Lake Bangweulu and Katanga, and there 
more reliable history begins. (Ina-Kafwaya, Kazembe's 
queen, referred to in the chapter on " Polyandry," was then 
alive and a lady of importance whose picture appears in 
Livingstone's Last Journals.) Kazembe's capital was then 
not far from the spot where it is to-day, at the extreme 
S.E. corner of Lake Mweru. About 1868 the Arab, 
Tipu Tib, appeared, fighting and travelling round the 
north end of Lake Mweru ; he was heading for Manyema 
in Congoland, where he settled. 

Considering that all the European travellers who visited 
Kazembe (save Dr. Livingstone) were Portuguese, Portugal 
naturally considered that they had a first claim to the 
country, but like many another claim, their pretensions 
rested on very flimsy foundations. On similar grounds 
and for like reasons one had heard them volubly claim 
not only Angola, but N.W. Rhodesia and the Congo. 
The only extant and detailed description of the now 
Wemba country, as it existed then, was given first by 
Lieut. Gerard, a French naval officer, and afterwards 
by Dr. Livingstone, both of whom visited the capital of 
the paramount chief, Kiti-Mukulu, then named Chita- 
pangwa, " the Uncreated One," which visits they describe 
in their journals with photos of the chief and country. 
They both circumnavigated Lake Bangweulu, from which 
the former returned to the East Coast and at the south end 
of which the latter died. 

The first British station in N.E. Rhodesia, which was 
chosen by Sir A. Sharpe and established by Capt. Crawshay, 
was at Chienji, at the extreme north end of Lake Mweru, 
where the first British flag was hoisted. Kidd and Bain- 
bridge followed him ? but both died at their post, one a 



Early Days of North-East Rhodesia 297 

week after the other, and are buried at Kalunguisi. Later, 
the Chienji station was removed to the Kalunguisi River 
and administered by Dr. Blair Watson and Hubert T. 
Harrington, with a sub-station at Choma under Cecil 
Warringham. The following year, 1893, Fort Abercorn 
was established by Mr. Marshall with a sub-station at 
Sumbu, at the south-west corner of Tanganyika. H. C. 
Marshall was vested with powers as Consular Judicial 
Officer at Abercorn, and a Mr. Knight was put in charge 
at Sumbu. Marshall's force consisted of half a dozen 
Sikhs and a few trained Atonga from Lake Nyasa, for 
N.E. Rhodesia was, until 1895, governed from the British 
Central African headquarters at Zemba in Nyasaland. 
The country was full of Arabs, so that gunpowder and 
gun-running, with war and the slave trade, were in full 
swing in every quarter. I travelled to Abercorn from the 
Katanga in 1893 with Fred S. Arnot, pioneer missionary 
of the Brethren's Mission in Central Africa, and the three 
frontier posts of Choma, Sumbu, and Abercorn had their 
hands full, chasing, fighting, and capturing Arabs. These 
posts formed an outer cordon along the northern border, 
including the Belgian Congo and German East Africa, and 
many a stiff little fight was put up against Arabs, Rugarugas, 
and native slavers that never appeared and never will 
appear in print. 

Many a time round the camp fires of an evening or at 
the fire in front of the pioneer huts of officials or mission- 
aries, or of Andrew Laws, a Scotch ex-R.H.A. man who 
had seen service in India, the only existing representative 
of trade, have we listened to stories of fights with Arabs 
and natives in which the missionary and trader took an 
honourable part. One missionary I knew was called " the 
bullet maker," because he served out and made ammuni- 
tion for the natives with which to defend themselves from 



298 Early Days of North-East Rhodesia 

hordes of raiding A-Wemba. The story of Laws' running 
fight with Sename in the Congo near Kilwa Island and of 
his smashing up of the walled town of the Arab Teleka, 
are two of a score of interesting items from the early days. 
Round the African Lake Corporation's store at Kituta I 
remember seeing several disabled natives who were em- 
ployed as watchmen and did light work, having been shot 
and got broken limbs in these unofficial fights with slave 
traders and cut-throat Arabs and natives. I remember at 
Abercorn in 1893 seeing several gangs of Arab and other 
slavers in chains, some gaudily dressed in silk turbans and 
wearing silver swords. The original Fort Abercorn was 
represented by a few mud and thatch huts, offices, and a 
prison. These were built and the country was administered 
by H. C. Marshall, formerly a big-game hunter, and one 
of the best men I have ever met. He is to-day Acting- 
Administrator of the whole of Northern Rhodesia. These 
were the palmy days of transition, when there were no 
game laws, reserves, or licences necessary, and when men 
could and did shoot scores of elephants, the ivory of which 
brought good prices. In those days also there were no 
questions asked if a man in self-defence armed his camp 
carriers and burned a village, a number of men being shot 
on both sides. One has seen diaries of plucky prospectors 
which read like this : " 20th. Found a quartz outcrop and 
noticed indications of . . . Went on and was attacked in 
the afternoon by a horde of armed natives who fired on 
our men, wounding two and killing one. We replied 
shooting seven, and following them up, burned their 
village. 25th. Travelling along low hills crossed three 
streams — formation . . . Were surrounded by a band of 
slavers who attacked us in our camp and who shot two of 
our men. We made a sortie and chased them, killing five 
and wounding three, who fell into our hands," etc. 



Early Days of North-East Rhodesia 299 

In 1895 Major Forbes with three other troopers trekked 
up across the Zambesi from the south and that year took 
over the administration of baby N.E. Rhodesia. He 
established a number of stations, forming a strong outer 
cordon of posts, and then others were run into the Wemba 
country, where the Arabs had fostered resistance among the 
natives. Four great chiefs, Mwamba, Kitimkulu, Mpolo- 
koso, and Kazembe, after a number of small scraps tendered 
their submission, and welcomed the administration and posts 
at or near their various centres and capitals. Major Forbes 
was invalided home in 1897, and in October, 1898, Mr. 
Codrington came north, extending and consolidating the 
young colony. In 1899 the headquarters of the British 
South African administration was removed from Zomba 
to Fort Jameson in Mpeseni's country. During the 
transition period for three months the country was ad- 
ministered from Fife and Abercorn, and in 1900 Mr. 
Robert Codrington was made Administrator of N.E. 
Rhodesia, with headquarters at Fort Jameson. During 
these early years, as I said, British Central Africa and N.E. 
Rhodesia represented identical interests and were under 
one administration, which helped to simplify operations 
against the Arabs, who were the backbone of resistance 
and everywhere endeavoured to retard progress and the 
advance of the British flag. Sir H. H. Johnston, A. J. 
Swann, and other early pioneers, made every effort to 
settle matters amicably, but the Arabs, at the back of whom 
were many powerful turbulent native chiefs, refused to 
listen to reason or accept any terms save gun-terms as they 
called them. " Let the gun speak," or, " We only hear a 
gun " (tustkia bunduki tu), were their oft-repeated answers 
to all attempts at conciliation. " Guerre a outrance " 
was the only possible alternative, and Mlozi Kopakopa and 
other Arabs were smashed up at Karonga in their three 



300 Early Days of North-East Rhodesia 

walled towns. Mlozi was hanged after trial by the Konde 
chiefs and people, who had been his victims for long years, 
a large part of whom had been driven into the lake to be 
eaten by crocodiles while the Arabs stood by to shoot any 
who might attempt to escape. Saidi Mwazungu was 
hanged further south by Swann for the murder of two 
Europeans. Jumbe of Kotakota, Mwasi, Makanjira, Zirafi, 
and many other Arabs and underlings had their power for 
evil permanently broken, and all felt the keen edge of 
British justice. Thus civilisation went forward in Nyasa- 
land, and trading companies, missionary societies, coffee 
and cotton planters, joined hand in hand to help to heal 
Africa's " open sore," and to keep the flag flying. 

As in British Central Africa so in N.E. Rhodesia the ques- 
tion of Arab domination and evil influence had to be 
settled once for all. A fight at Mpolokosos in the Wemba 
country settled the Arabs there. Palangwa, Kafindo, 
Abdullah Ibn Suleiman, with Chiwala, Simba, and many 
others, were sitting on the fence watching their chance. 
Simba, on Kilwa Island, Lake Mweru, fought and expelled 
the Congo State forces by which he had been twice at- 
tacked, and eventually asked for the protection of the 
British flag. Kilwa was thus annexed by Dr. Blair Watson 
and the British flag was hoisted. Abdullah at Kabuta, 
though he played fast and loose and kept a horde of Swahiii 
and Rugaruga robbers under leash, eventually rendered his 
submission to Dr. B. Watson and accepted the flag. 
Chiwala let N.E. Rhodesia severely alone, and confined his 
filibustering and slave-trading expeditions to the Congo 
State. On one occasion when he came to a British camp 
with a conciliatory present of ivory I was present and was 
asked to interpret, and tell him that if he wanted to live in 
N.E. Rhodesia (he had been driven out of the Congo) he 
would get short shrift if he repeated his Congo slave 



Early Days of North-East Rhodesia 301 

practices. The Arabs Palangwa and Kafindo cleared out, 
and a number of others who came later, ostensibly to 
trade on the Luapula River near to my home, were also 
expelled by the Magistrate, G. Lyons, and were sent 
back to German East Africa, whence they came, a good 
riddance. Thus after a few years' hard work in N.E. 
Rhodesia by a small and inadequate handful of officials 
the only Arab remaining was old Abdullah, whose power 
for active harm became nil, so that, instead of trading or 
stealing ivory and slaves as formerly, he latterly grew rice 
and bred milk goats and fat-tailed sheep, for which good 
prices were obtained. Abdullah was one of Tipu Tib's 
lieutenants and representatives, and told me he knew Dr. 
Livingstone, of whom he spoke respectfully as Bwana 
Daud (or Lord David), for so he was called by the Arabs. 

For many years one of the least known and most diffi- 
cult and inaccessible corners of N.E. Rhodesia was Lake 
Bangweulu, with its many islands. The Bisa, Batwa, 
Baunga, and other peoples who occupied various parts of 
the lake were among the last — if not the very last — to 
submit to the Government and pay hut tax. Among their 
swamps and floating islands they considered themselves 
impregnable and immune from attack, and insulted and 
shot at Government officials and messengers again and 
again with impunity until they got a few sharp lessons. 
It is one of the largest of the four lakes found encircling 
N.E. Rhodesia. I reckon it approximately 120 miles long 
by about 80 miles wide, its length and width altering with 
the wet and dry seasons. There are large plains along the 
east side and at the south end, where live the three water 
tribes, Bisa, Batwa, and Baunga. These plains are alive 
with Lechwe and Sititunga antelopes, duck, and geese, and 
with waterfowl of many kinds. The upper surface of the 
boggy plains is covered with stretches of peat which, during 



302 Early Days of North-East Rhodesia 

the grass fire season, burn steadily until the heavy rains 
come and put out the fires. Enormous quantities and 
many varieties of good fish are caught everywhere, besides 
fresh- water shrimps and otters, with which these lake 
peoples used to pay tax. The east side and south end is 
entirely swamp, whereas the west side has a few hills. 
Lycanthropy is practised round the lake, and a few notorious 
doctors whom I know have earned a great reputation 
(Kasoma and Chama), and do a profitable business with 
their reputed lion packs. The natives have an implicit and 
unshakable faith in this form of black magic. (See 
Gouldsbury's poem on the Chisanguka.) 

The three chief islands are Chirui, Kisi, and Mbawala, 
which had about thirty villages each, and were well popu- 
lated and cultivated. Formerly there were herds of cattle, 
but such is not the case to-day. I have been all round the 
lake, and on its many islands again and again during the 
past twenty odd years, and I should say that Bangweulu 
has a great future as a fishing and boating centre. Otter 
skins, Lechwe skins, and shawls, with fat-tailed sheep and 
goats, as well as fish and antelope flesh, are in great demand 
in Northern Rhodesia and the Congo, whence many 
traders come to buy. The hut tax, which has been raised 
from 3s. to 5s. and now to 10s., is more easily paid by them 
than by their land neighbours. All round the big lake there 
are dozens of little lakes from several hundred yards to 
several miles long. There are also a number of arms of 
the lake that remind one of Loch Long and other Scottish 
lochs. The people belong chiefly to the anthill clan, and 
cultivate little patches of grain round the foot of these 
termitic structures. They also live on the roots and seeds 
of the water lily, besides edible roots and leaves of many 
kinds, on which I have lived myself when on a journey and 
when food was scarce. 



Early Days of North-East Rhodesia 303 

As previously referred to the Arabs stirred up the Wemba 
chief Mpolokoso, who decided to put up a fight against the 
Government with Arab help. It cost the chief and people 
dear and the Arabs dearer still, for few of them escaped. 
W. R. Johnston was left as official in charge of the first 
administration station there. Hunting one day he shot 
five lions ; the fifth, a lioness, charged him and chased him 
up a tree, from which he was dragged down, and the 
experience cost him his life. This story is told elsewhere 
in the chapter on " Sport and Travel." 

Kalunguisi station, one of the first to be built, was in 
charge of Blair Watson for many years. As he kept an 
Arab teacher and spoke and wrote Swahili fluently, besides 
having a good knowledge of natives and native law, he did 
much to pacify the natives along the Congo border, and 
inaugurated the first hut tax, and cut the first road by 
purely native labour. 

About this time the Lunda chief Kazembe gave trouble, 
fired a few guns, and refused to take the flag. Dr. Watson, 
with a small force of Europeans and native levies, attacked 
Kazembe, who fled to Johnston Falls, and was eventually, 
on a promise of pardon, handed over to the Government by 
the missionary lady there. He was reinstated, and shortly 
after this Fort Rosebery was built by G. Lyons at Johnston 
Falls, which falls were named after Sir Harry Johnston by 
Sir A. Sharpe while on a political mission to Msidi in the 
Katanga. I lived here for a dozen years or more. Mr. 
Harrington succeeded Lyons, and the latter trekked to the 
south bend of the Luapula River and built another station 
at Sekontwe where good work was done, though it was 
afterwards suppressed. Thus, step by step, the adminis- 
tration of the country went forward, while taxation was 
peacefully instituted everywhere and roads were made, 
rivers bridged, while in course of time posts were established 



304 Early Days of North-East Rhodesia 

in every important centre of the new territory. There was 
little noise and no newspaper reports, but the work of 
civilisation progressed without a single revolt or costly war. 
Of course in the early days men had to endure hardships 
and privation, with sugar and flour at is. 6d. per lb. and 
tea at 7s. 6d., while they lived in mud huts surrounded by 
strong stockades to prevent surprise attacks from quarrel- 
some natives or slave-trading Arabs who hated our anti- 
slavery administration. Every official had to hammer out 
his little band of soldier police and native servants from the 
raw material to hand, and one can still hear the tootling 
of the old brass bugle that did duty, played by a sturdy 
local ex-fisher lad who had been taught the various calls 
by his Bwana. When the official was doing a round of the 
district sometimes the local missionary or trader would be 
left in charge to receive mails and despatch them, and as 
there was always the possibility of a surprise attack the guns 
had to be kept clean. 

The hoisting and lowering of the flag was always a 
solemn occasion in those early days. Next to this was the 
arrival of the monthly or bimonthly mail. Sometimes 
the letters were intact and dry, but sometimes they had 
been dropped in a river by the way. On one occasion the 
mail failed to turn up, and searching along the road a red 
fez cap was found, a bit of the postman's skull, and a lot of 
scattered letters, and alongside, the spoor of a big lion. 
Newspapers were common property and passed round 
from one to another. " The simple life " describes pioneer- 
ing in the early days of N.E. Rhodesia. In 1900 Fort 
Jameson was established as Government headquarters after 
the Angoni were smashed and Mpeseni pacified. The era 
of burnt brick, collars and ties, and ladies set in, so that 
from 1900 onward the real civilised development of N.E. 
Rhodesia began. Stockades were pulled down and one by 



Early Days of North-East Rhodesia 305 

one Government stations were built to a paper plan, built 
of brick and tile under the supervision of a white builder. 
European doors and windows were put even in the prisons 
and stores. " Fort Jim," as we called it, assumed import- 
ance with a Residence, its orderly built and kept offices, its 
public works and prison, with printing presses and materials 
turning out official documents and papers the pride oj old 
Cromher's lije. I have seen old Crowther (the printer) at 
work in his office in pyjamas and dressing-gown, shaking 
all over with fever when he should have been in bed with 
a hot-water bottle. Mr. Codrington, the administrator, 
had kindly asked Crowther to print a little " In Memoriam " 
card for me as I had just lost my younger son at Karonga. 
This I prize and keep, for now both the administrator and 
the head printer have also passed on : two pioneers of the 
early days of N.E. Rhodesia. 

The water tribes of Lake Bangweulu were the last to 
submit and pay hut tax. Now annually the natives roll up 
with their previous tax-papers stamped with duck, axe, or 
hoe (by which names the natives call the year's tax-paper) 
to pay their current taxes, and defaulters are comparatively 
few, A network of good roads intersects almost the whole 
country, even through many of the swamps. Rivers are 
bricged, and in road-making and bridge-building the natives 
turn out with their chiefs and work with a will. The 
Gorernment laws are becoming better understood, and the 
natives now know as they did not in earlier days what they 
may and what they may not do. Years ago some natives 
were sent to catch a murderer and bring him back " dead 
or alive." They caught him and killed him, and tying the 
dead body to a pole they brought him in to the official. 
As :he law was not well known then, and there was no 
malice, the men were let off with a severe public warning. 
Sometimes there are attempts made to evade the law, but 
u 



306 Early Days of North-East Rhodesia 

many of these are found out and punished. Cases of 
infanticide and witch-killing occur, but most of these 
eventually come to the light. One mission boy I know was 
caught by means of a letter he wrote to a friend in which 
he told of the killing of an " unlucky child." Still I 
should say that in proportion to the population criine is 
greater almost anywhere in Europe than it is in Northern 
Rhodesia. 

There have been lots of petty troubles along the Belgian 
boundary from Bangweulu to Tanganyika, though, on the 
whole, friendly relations exist among both British and 
Belgian officials. Some natives to escape hut tax play fast 
and loose, and often criminals escape from one side to the 
other. 

The Kabwalala robber gang is the most glaring instance 
of frontier difficulty. A frontier native is facetiously 
called " Mr. Facing- both- ways " (Mpumi Kubilt). 

Sleeping sickness and the removal of the population from 
the river-banks led to a wholesale exodus of natives into the 
Congo, for the Belgians did not enforce their law as strictly 
as they were supposed to do, and left the villages or. the 
bank of the river. Fish was the attraction. Johnston Falls 
is a stretch of rapids extending for seventeen miles, aid at 
the north end enormous quantities of fish are caught, split, 
smoked, and sold. Large herds of game, including buffaloes 
and elephants, used to roam here, and leopards and lions 
are still a perfect nuisance. On the Belgian side the tsetse 
fly are bad, whereas on the British side we keep herds of 
healthy cattle. The sleeping sickness fly, glossina patyalis, 
is found along the banks of the Luapula here, and the 
morsitans in the forests around. The natives are now made 
to clear the grass and vegetation along the river-banks and 
round their villages, as the fly feeds on the mosquito larvae 
found on the vegetation on the river-banks. There is good 



Early Days of North-East Rhodesia 307 

fishing and shooting here, as also along the valley of the 
Luapula River. 

Farming and mining in N.E. Rhodesia are in the initial 
stage and no great fortunes are likely to be made in these 
lines for many years to come. Cattle are few in N.E. 
Rhodesia save round Fort Jameson and on the Saisi River, 
Abercorn, where good bulls have been introduced and the 
stock improved. 

Recruiting is the great asset of N.E. Rhodesia, and two 
great recruiting companies are at work throughout the 
territory ; the Rhodesian Native Labour Bureau and the 
Robert Williams Co., or " Tanganyika Concessions." The 
former recruits boys for the farms and mines of Southern 
Rhodesia, whereas the latter recruits for the Union Miniere 
du haut Katanga (Katanga copper mines). Last year over 
twelve thousand were recruited by the Robert Williams 
Co., and each boy is well cared for, fed, and tended medi- 
cally, receives half his pay in the Congo and the other half 
on returning to Rhodesia. The native is, I believe, the one 
and cnly permanent asset of Africa, and the future progress 
and peace of the country depends largely on the intelligent 
understanding and just treatment of the native races. As 
Inspector of Recruiting for Robert Williams and Co. in 
connection with Angola and Rhodesian natives, I have on 
visiting the boys at work, or in their well-kept compounds, 
been often amused. " For whom are you working ? " I 
have asked again and again. " Tuli bantu ba Robert " — 
" We are the people of Robert," they have replied. The 
recruits of R. Williams and Co., like little Topsy, prefer to 
think they belong to somebody. The British South African 
Co. are jealous of the treatment of their natives, and will 
only confide recruiting licences to those who are in a 
position to accord the best possible treatment and pay to 
the natives. 



308 Early Days of North-East Rhodesia 

At present N.E. Rhodesia is marking time while waiting 
for the advent of the iron horse to replace " Adam's bus," 
and the antiquated system of native porters. Even the 
Congo is ahead in this respect, and it is to be hoped that 
— mines or no mines discovered — a line of railway will soon 
run through N.E. Rhodesia, joining up the Cape with 
Tanganyika. I have heard it said that the money spent on 
the carrying of war loads between Ndola and Kasama 
across Bangweulu, and the making and maintaining of a 
motor road from Kashitu to Abercorn would more than 
have paid for the construction of a permanent railway and 
a supply of rolling stock for use from Broken Hill to 
Tanganyika. 

" Mieux tard que jamais ! " 



_MAP FOR "IN THE HEART OF BANTULAND" 




Sceky. Service &• Co., Limiled. 38 Gral Ru*ll Sum 



J 



INDEX 



A 

Aborigines Protection Society, 30 
Abortion, 92, 226 
African Lakes Corporation, 298 
African Nimrods, 192 
Amusing mistakes, 203 
Ancestry, pride of, 144 
Angola, 18 

Anti-Slavery Society, 30 

Arab chief, blind, 257 

Arabs, 26 ; and Islam, 253 ; Nyasa- 

land, 300 ; Rhodesia, 301 
Army, native, 38, 39 
Arnot, F. S., 225, 262, 297 
Augury of life and death, 229 

B 

Babel, the Tower of, 260 

Baby, birth and names, 167 ; a 

lucky, 169 
Bag, biggest, 290 
Bailundu, 23, 24 
Baker, Sir S., 188 
Balala, 265 

Balomotwa tribe, 266 

Bandits, 63 

Bangweulu, 190, 302 

Bantus, the, 17; language, 17; 

tyranny, 43, 167, 204, 213, 223 
Bartelott, Major, 259 
Basanga, 264 
Bashila tribe, 195 
Batetela, 260 

Battle between two bull antelopes, 
287 

Batwa tribe, 195 
Baunga tribe, 195 
Baushi tribe, 265 



Bay, Lobito, 18, 21 
Beads, 141 
Beer, 136, 137 
Beeswax, 19 
Bellen, Capt., 260 
Belmonte, 19 
Benguella, 18, 20 
Bia, Capt., 270 
Big devils, 32 
Bihe, 19, 22 

Birds and birds' songs, 291 

Black, eating, 133 

Black ivory hunters, 20, 29 

Blood sanctification, 249 

Bodson, Capt., 269 

Bonchamps, Marquis de, 269 

Boys and girls, 1 70 

Brasseur, Capt., 257, 265 

British, first station in N.E. Rho- 
desia, 296 

British, first officials in N.E. Rho- 
desia, 296 

Broeck, van den, Capt., 270 

Buffalo, 189, 280, 281 

Bulindu, 109 

Bumbuli, 107 

Burning a robber, 50 

Bushman folklore story, 181 

Butwa secret society, 96, 106 ; 
temple, 240 ; doctor, 241 

Buyembe, cannibal society, 108 

C 

Calling curses on witch, 228 
Camps and carriers, 278 
Cannibal soldiers, 258 
Canoe digging, 124 
Cape to Cairo Railway, 308 
Cape Verde Islands, 19 



309 



Index 



Capello and Ivens, 268 
Caravan, slave, 28 
Carta de Liberdade, 34 
Carving, wood, 120 
Casus belli, 58 
Catumbella, 18, 20, 23 
Cause of downfall of Msidi, 39 
Central African Arabs, 253 
Ceremonies, puberty, for girls, 
154 

Chamunda's, brave wives, 166 
Charms, 24, 243 

Chief who killed his counsellors, 
176 

Chiefs, great, 299 
Children, slave, 31 
Chiwala, 257 
Chokwe tribe, 31 
Chona, Luba chief, 166 
Cicatrisation and tattooing, 143 
Circumcision, 154 
Civilisation, native view of, 138 
Clan ostracism, 89 ; taboos, 91 
Clans, royal, 89, 90 ; totemic, 

89 

Coal fields, Congo, 271 
Cocoa Island, 29 
Codrington, R., 305 
Colonisation, African, 43 
Colonists, Lunda, 42 
Commerce and churches in Katanga, 
272 

Cooks, native, 134 
Copper Industry, 118, 263 
Copper, working, 262 
Copying European dress, 149 
Courtship and marriage ceremonies, 
150 

Crawford, D., 260, 275 
Crawshay, Capt., 296 
Crime, 22 

Crocodile and monkey story, 290 
Crocodiles, 287 
Crucifix and Koran, 26 
Cruel customs, 67 
Cryptic language, 98, 104 
Cultivation and king, 36 
Cursing ceremony, 196 



D 

Dance, war, 66 

Dangers and war, 276 

Dead Man's Land, 17, 18 

Dead witch case, 79 

Decoration and dress, 143 

Delcommune, Capt., 269 

Delveux, Lieut., 270 

Delvienne, Lieut., 270 

Dental decoration, 145 

Devil, man who hunted with the, 179 

Devil doctors, 25 

Dhanis, Baron, 260 

Dialects, 22 

Dilanda, chief, 265 

Dilolo, L., 31 

Dinkas, tribe, 139 

Diseases and remedies, 241 

Divination, 224 

Divining, 225, 226 

Divorce, 157 

Doctors, unqualified, 86 ; lion, 115 ; 

kinds of, 81 ; spear, 78 ; witch, 75 
Dog, " Richter," the, 292 
Dress, native, and habits, 139, 146 
Drink and food, 128 

E 

Early days of N.E. Rhodesia, 295 
East, burial facing, 17 
Education, 130 
Eland antelope, 189, 283 
Elephant, my first, 279 
Elephants and dangerous game, 186, 
279 

Elisabeth ville, 195, 271 
End of slave-trading Arabs, 260 
Endogamy, laws, 88 
England, why she lost Katanga, 40 
European country, 24 ; philan- 
thropy, native view of, 55 
Evidences, slavery, 23 
Executions, 73 
Exile, slavery, 27 
Exogamy, 87 

Experience with witch, 229 
Export slavery, 26 



Index 



3ii 



F 

Falls, Johnston, 285 

Fairy nursemaid and mother, 182 

Fans, tribe, 139 

Faulkner, Mr., 269 

Fetish war, 62, 237 

Fetishes, 85, 235, 236, 237 

Fetishes, farmers', 239 

Fetishism and medicine, 234 

Fight with lions, 303 

First blood decides, 64 

Fish, tiger, 292 

Fishing and hunting, 186, 193 

Five wedding songs, 232 

Flies, sleeping sickness, 306 

Folklore, 23 

Food and drink, 128 

Forbes, Major, 299 

Founding of Msidi's kingdom, 267 

Freed-slave villages, 33 

Froment, Lieut., 64, 270 

G 

Game pits, 191 ; nets, 192 
Games, children's, 171 
Gangellas, 22 
Gangs of slaves, 31 
Geophagy, 136 

God, names for, 244 ; prayer and 

praise to, 248 
Goitre country, 24 
Government, 35 ; by will of people, 

41 ; concerning slavery, 30 
Grey, Geo., 286 
Groups of languages, 201 
Guerilla warfare, 63 
Guild songs, 114 
Guilds, trade, 113 
Gun, keeping it clean, 304 

H 

Hand, left and right, 128 
Hankinnson, Lieut., 191 
Hare and earless boy, the story of, 
177 

Harrington, H. T., 297 
Headdresses, 140 



Hell's mouth, 18 
Hemptinne, M. de, 292 
Heraldry, possible origin of, 143 
Hippo hunting, 189, 282 • ivory, 190 
Hoeing song, 36 
Holy days, 249 

Honey, the man who hid, 183 
Hospitality, 45 
Hospitals, Katanga, 272 
Hostages, 65 

Humbe, cattle country, 23 

Humorist, a native, 41 

Hump navel and the witch, 175 

Hunger for meat, 129 

Hungry country, 33 

Hunter chiefs, 36 

Hunters, 186 

Hunters' taboos, 94 ; paradise, 286 
Hunting big game, 283 ; lions and 

leopards, 284 ; rhino, 188 ; others, 

190 ; tribal, 188 

I 

Ina Kafwaya, 166 
Infanticide, 72 

Inheritance laws, 148 ; of wives, 156 
Inhumanity of slavery, 33 
Initiation of witch doctor, 76 ; of 

a hunter, 230 
Inoculation, 242 
Internal wars, 62 
Iron smelting, 118 
Ivory, 9 

J 

Jealousy, 158 

Jester, Court and village, 41 
Johnston, Sir H., 269, 299 
Jumbe of Kota Kota, 254 

K 

Kabwalala, secret society, ill 
Kafindo, Arab chief, 256 
Kafwimbi, chief, 70 
Kakonda, 20 ; annexation, 269 ; 

administration, 272 
Kalene Hill, 33 
Kasenga, 241 



312 



Index 



Katanga, 43 ; story of, 262 
Kazembe, 139 

Kibonge, murderer of Emin Pasha, 
256 

King, the idea of, 35 ; retirement 
of, 42 

King's choice of wives, 38 
Kingdom, a mushroom, 37, 258 
Knight, Mr., 297 
Konde tribe, 139 
Kortekaas, Mr., 20 
Kwanza, R., 22 



L 

Labour, recruiting, 307 
Lane, F. TV, 269 

Language, learning, 24, 197 ; ono- 
matopoeic theory, 197 ; method 
of learning, 197 ; rhythm, 200 ; 
and languages, 206 

Law, native respect for, 40 

Laws, Andrew, 297 

Laws, Dr., 200 

Laws : land, 49 ; native, 46 ; pro- 
perty, 48 ; theft, 50 ; assault, 51 ; 
adultery, 51 ; arson, 52; mutila- 
tion, 51 ; murder, 52 ; marriage, 

53 ; divorce, 54 ; compensation, 

54 ; fines and fees, 54 ; witches, 
wizards, 53, 68, 228, 229 ; trials 
and procedure, 56 ; punishments, 

55 ; of peace and war, 57 ; of 
symbolism, 58, 59, 60 ; Nkole law, 
59 ; ultimatum, 59 

Legat, Capt., 270 
Leper taboos, 93 
Linguae francae, 262 
Livingstone, Dr., 33 
Luba tribe, 154, 266 
Lubaland, 165 

Luena and Lunda tribes, 31, 154, 
164 

Lufoi, R., first poste, 270 
Lugard, Capt., 299 
Lycanthropy, 115 
Lyons, G., magistrate, 30 1 



M 

Mafinge, Luba chief, 165 
Magic mat, story of the, 165 
Mahanga, amazon, 66, 164 
Malfeyt, Major, 260 
Marshall, H. C, 297 
Mashukulumbwe, 129 
Matabele tribe, 37 
Matiamvo, chief, 164 
Matriarchal and patriarchal, 161 
Medicines, 161, 243 
Mining, Katanga, 272 
Mirambo, 267 
Mlozi, Arab chief, 256 
Monkeys, 289 

Monogamy, native view of, 1 59 
Monstrosities, 72 
Mpande, chief, 264 
Msidi I, 263 ; Msidi II, 165 
Mulowanyama, 265 
Muruturula, Arab chief, 255 
Mutilations, 69-71 
Mutwila, chief, 264 

N 

Necromancer, 288 
Newspapers, Katanga, 272 
Nimrods, native, 265 
Nya-Katolo, Luena queen, 163 

O 

Oaths, native, 251 
Opening up the country, 299 
Ordeal, boiling water, 18 
Ovimbundu tribe, 24 

P 

Palangwa, 256 

Pete, old, 20, 21 

Pioneers, passing of two, 305 

Poison cup test, 68 

Polyandrous queens, three, 163 

Polyandry, 163 

Polygamy, 160, 161 ; and poisoning, 
162 

Portuguese, 18, 296 
Punishments, 67 



Index 



313 



R 

Railway, Katanga, 272 
Reichard, 269 
Reincarnation, 226 
Rescue of women and children, 69, 
276 

Revolt of Congo State soldiers, 260 
Rugaruga, 65 
Rumaliza, 259 

S 

Salt Industry, 125 
Sanitation, forms of, 37 
Secret society, 96 ; police, no 
Selim Ibn Raschid, 259 
Semi-civilised natives, 40 
Sename Rugaruga, 256 
Serckel, Lieut., 270 
Sharpe, Sir A., 269 
Shipwrecked slaves, 31 
Silva Porto, 19, 20 
Simba, Arab chief, 256 
Slave Road (Red Road), 17 
Slave trade, 19 
Slavers, 17 

Slavery, 23, 24, 26, 27, 30, 34, 269 
Slaves, 27 ; raiding, 27 ; prices, 28 ; 

market, 28, 30, 31 
Socialism, 44 

Society of robbers, in ; women's, 
no 

Spear boundary, 37 
Spirit kings, queens, and chiefs, 93, 
227 

Sport and travel, 274 
Stairs, Capt., 269 
Stanley, H. M., 259 
Sterility, 92 
Stone wall towns, 256 



Striking a blow for the slaves, 32 
Suleiman, Abdullah Ibn, 255 
Surprise stories, 175 
Swahili, 65 

Swann, A. J., 255, 295, 299 
Syphilis, 94 

T 

Teleka, Arab chief, 259 

Test for site of village, 230 

Theology and religion, 244 

Thomson, H. B., 269 

Three thousand miles on foot, 275 

Tipu Tib, 259 

Tobacco industry, 127 

Totem brothers, 88 

Totemism, 87 

Trial by pepper pipe, 70 

Tunyama tribe, 20 

V 

Ventriloquism, 85 
Verdickt, Capt., 257 

W 

War, outbreak, 60 ; songs and 
ovation, 239 ; of offence and 
aggrandisement, 61 

Warringham, C, 297 

Watson, Dr. Blair, 297 

Wemba tribe, 37, 65 

Women chiefs, 163 

Y 

Yeke tribe, origin of, 65, 265, 267 
Z 

Zulu, 65 



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